A new species of Veronicastrum wulingense G.W. Hu & Q.F. Wang was recently published by a research team from the Wuhan Botanical Garden of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Pingbaying National Forest Park, southwest Hubei, China. The new species is the first identified and named by the research team, and the only new species of this genus published in Chinese mainland in the past four decades.
Veronicastrum Heist. ex Fabr. is a perennial herb genus in the tribe Veroniceae in the family Plantaginaceae, with about 20 species, which are mainly distributed in East Asia, except for one species discontinuously distributed in eastern North America. 13 Veronicastrum species are original distribution records in China, and most of them are Chinese endemic species. This genus of species is important medicinal resource and the whole plant can be used as medicine, rich in a variety of active medicinal ingredients, which has the curative effect in antioxidant, antisepsis, anti-inflammatory, cancer prevention, especially effective in the treatment of ascites caused by schistosoma. Veronicastrum species are also excellent ornamental garden resources, which can be cultivated as understory ground cover or flower bed landscape.
In June 2021, HU Guangwan's team was invited to investigate plant resources in Pingbaying National Forest Park, southwest Hubei Province. They found several clusters of distinctively morphological Veronicastrum individuals, with plants procumbent and arching on the humus of the stone wall along the plank road above the karst cave in the scenic spot of Sidong Canyon. The whole plant also was purplish-red when young, and the small purplish-red flowers were densely clustered at the tip of the inflorescence axis, 2-3 cm long. This unknown Veronicastrum species attracted the interest of the research team, so they collected some live material for further study.
Through in-depth morphological and molecular systematic studies of the genus of Veronicastrum, this population was verified as a new taxon of Veronicastrum species that had not been reported in previous literature. It was named "Veronicastrum wulingense" based on its type location in the Wulingshan Region of western Hubei.
It is similar in morphology to Veronicastrum liukiuense from the Ryukyu Islands, but can be clearly distinguished by its axillary inflorescences (versus terminal on short leafy branches), pedicels up to 2.5 mm (versus sessile), corollas purple to purple-red (versus white tinged with pale purple), flowering in June to July (versus September to October), and distributed in the limestone mountain at an altitude of 1,000-1,400 m (versus low altitude island).
Furthermore, these diagnostic features of peduncles up to seven cm, flowers clustered densely in rachis apex and steadily ca. two-three cm long, which are unique in the all known Veronicastrum species of axillary inflorescences. Molecular phylogenetic studies show that the new species is an independent clade of the phylogenetic tree.
The discovery of this new species not only reflects the diverse habitat and high species diversity in the Wulingshan Region of western Hubei, but also has great significance for the further study of the speciation, evolution and biogeography of Veronicastrum species in East Asia.
It is noteworthy that only two wild populations with a few individuals of V. wulingense have been found after continuous investigation in the surrounding of the distribution area. One is distributed on the side of the plank road in the Sidong Canyon, and the other is in the mountain near the village in Bajiao Township, where there is a situation of wild resource digging and sale. It is urgent for the relevant departments to strengthen their protection of the wild resources and rescue population propagation.
The results, entitled "Veronicastrum wulingense (Plantaginaceae), a new species from Southwestern Hubei, China," were published in Botanical Studies.
