Authors: Carine, Mark A.; Humphries, Christopher J.¹; Guma, I. Rosana²; Reyes-Betancort, J. Alfredo²; Santos Guerra, Arnoldo²

Source: Journal of Biogeography, Volume 36, Number 4, April 2009 , pp. 593-611(19)

Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

Abstract:

Aim 

Areas of endemism are the fundamental units of cladistic biogeographical analysis but there is no consensus on the most appropriate method for their delimitation. In this paper, the relative performance of a number of algorithmic approaches for the delimitation of areas of endemism is investigated within the context of the Canary Islands flora, and areas of endemism within the Canary Islands archipelago are defined. Location 

The Canary Islands. Methods 

A data matrix comprising the distributions of 609 endemic spermatophyte taxa (c. 90% of the endemic flora) scored on a 10 × 10 km UTM grid was analysed using: (1) UPGMA (unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean) clustering of Jaccard and Kulczynski similarity coefficient matrices, (2) parsimony analysis of endemicity (PAE), and (3) the programndm(eNDeMism). The performance of each method was then determined by the extent to which the resulting areas of endemism met three criteria: (1) possession of two or more strict endemic taxa, (2) diagnosability, and (3) geographical contiguity. Results 

Each of the four methods resulted in substantially different sets of areas.ndmanalysis resolved 17 areas of endemism consistent with all three criteria, and collectively these accounted for 59% of all cells. In the hierarchical analyses none of the methods recovered more than eight areas of endemism, and the total coverage of cells ranged from 13% to 33% when the results were confined to intra-island areas of endemism. Main conclusions 

ndmoutperforms hierarchical clustering methods in terms of both the number of intra-island areas of endemism delimited that meet the three evaluation criteria and the total coverage of those areas.ndmmay also be considered preferable because it is non-hierarchical, incorporates spatial information into the delimitation of areas, and permits overlap between areas of endemism where there is evidence to support it. The results support the use ofndmas the most appropriate method currently available for the delimitation of areas of endemism. The areas of endemism identified by thendmanalysis are discussed.

Keywords: Areas of endemism; Canary Islands; cladistic biogeography; ndm; PAE; phenetics

Document Type: Research article

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2699.2008.02016.x

Affiliations: 1: Department of Botany, The Natural History Museum, London, UK 2: Unidad de Botánica Aplicada, Instituto Canario de Investigaciones Agrarias, Jardín de Aclimatación de La Orotava, Puerto de La Cruz, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain

Publication date: 2009-04-01

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