Search

Gentiana autumnalis (pine barren gentian) is a rare, fall-flowering perennial that is endemic to pine barren habitat from New Jersey to South Carolina. This disturbance-adapted, early successional species is at risk in New Jersey as a result of human interactions, namely growing season mowing and fire suppression. We used a repeated measures design to compare the differences between managed (mowing and prescribed fire) and unmanaged G. autumnalis populations for density, life stage, mortality, and fecundity. Managed populations had a greater gentian density, proportion of reproductive individuals, and seedlings compared to unmanaged populations. Implementing prescribed burns and mowing at previously unmanaged sites prior to spring growth increased gentian density, flowering, and seed set the same year. Our data support that prescribed burning and mowing can be beneficial management tools for the conservation of G. autumnalis and other disturbance-adapted species that require open early-successional habitat. However, their implementation can have negative consequences if conducted during the growing season, especially for roadside populations that are periodically mowed. Declining rare plant populations have the potential to benefit from management practices that facilitate ideal growing conditions and influence life stage transitions that will best improve population growth rate over time.

Stenanthium leimanthoides (A. Gray) Zomlefer & Judd, commonly known as pine barren deathcamas, is classified in the Melanthiaceae family and is a former member of the polyphyletic genus Zigadenus (Zomlefer and Judd 2002). It is spottily distributed from New York and New Jersey south through West Virginia to North Carolina and Tennessee. It also appears in the Gulf Coastal Plain, where it is a rare taxon ranging from west central Georgia (Carter et al. 2009) to south Alabama, northwest Florida (Anderson 1995), south Mississippi, and southeast Louisiana, perhaps extending as far west as east Texas (USDA Plants Database 2012). Plants in the Gulf Coastal Plain are generally very robust, sometimes attaining heights of two meters or more. Flowering in the latter region is mostly from May through the middle of June, and plants typically have paniculate inflorescences in which each branch (raceme) is elongate and tight. Habitats of Stenanthium leimanthoides range from Atlantic white cedar and bay swamps in Georgia and Florida, to cutover shrub bogs and seepage slopes in other southeastern states, including Alabama. Pine barren deathcamas is listed as an S1 taxon by the Alabama Natural Heritage Program (2011) in Auburn. Species with this ranking are considered critically imperiled due to extreme rarity. While conducting fieldwork in late May of 2008 in the coastal plain of southeastern Alabama (frequently referred to as the Wiregrass Region), a new population of Stenanthium leimanthoides was discovered. Plants were at peak anthesis in southwestern Barbour County, Alabama (Figure 1). This site is approximately 95 km southeast of Montgomery and is in the Southern Red Hills physiographic region and the Choctawhatchee–Pea River Watershed. Pine barren deathcamas plants had paniculate inflorescences (Figure 2) and were robust, with heights of up to two meters. The habitat for the newly discovered population of S. leimanthoides is a seepage slope along a power line in a highway right-ofway cut through a creek swamp with Magnolia virginiana L., Liriodendron tulipifera L., Nyssa biflora Walter, and Persea palustris (Raf.) Sarg. A collection was made using standard herbarium techniques and was deposited in The University of Georgia Herbarium (GA) and the Troy University Herbarium (TROY). Table 1 has a listing of vascular plant species associated with S. leimanthoides at the Barbour County site. Nomenclature primarily follows Weakley (2011). Standardized abbreviations for authorities were obtained from The International Plant Names Index (2012). To learn more about the distribution and ecology of Stenanthium leimanthoides in Alabama, curators of the following herbaria were consulted: University of Alabama (UNA), Auburn University (AUA), Jacksonville State University (JSU), University of North Alabama (UNAF), University of South Alabama (USAM), Troy University (TROY), University of West Alabama, the Anniston Museum of Natural History, and Vanderbilt University (VDB) housed at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT). Relevant specimens were directly examined at AUA, JSU, and TROY. The Alabama plant atlas (Kral et al. 2012) was accessed to verify the distribution of pine barren deathcamas in other regions of the state. Additional data on the distribution and habitats of this species were provided by the Alabama Natural Heritage Program in *email address: mwmorris@troy.edu Received June 8, 2011; Accepted September 11, 2012. DOI: 10.2179/12-016