| Vicia menziesii | |
|---|---|
 | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Kingdom: | Plantae |
| Clade: | Tracheophytes |
| Clade: | Angiosperms |
| Clade: | Eudicots |
| Clade: | Rosids |
| Order: | Fabales |
| Family: | Fabaceae |
| Tribe: | Fabeae |
| Genus: | Vicia |
| Species: | V. menziesii |
| Binomial name | |
| Vicia menziesii | |
Vicia menziesii is a rare species of flowering plant in the legume family known by the common name Hawaiian vetch. It is endemic to Hawaii, where it is known only from the island of Hawaii. It is threatened by habitat loss and exotic plants. It has been federally listed as an endangered species of the United States since 1978. [1] It was the first Hawaiian plant to be placed on the Endangered Species List. [2]
The Fabaceae or Leguminosae, commonly known as the legume, pea, or bean family, are a large and economically important family of flowering plants. It includes trees, shrubs, and perennial or annual herbaceous plants, which are easily recognized by their fruit (legume) and their compound, stipulate leaves. Many legumes have characteristic flowers and fruits. The family is widely distributed, and is the third-largest land plant family in number of species, behind only the Orchidaceae and Asteraceae, with about 751 genera and about 19,000 known species. The five largest of the genera are Astragalus, Acacia, Indigofera, Crotalaria, and Mimosa, which constitute about a quarter of all legume species. The ca. 19,000 known legume species amount to about 7% of flowering plant species. Fabaceae is the most common family found in tropical rainforests and in dry forests in the Americas and Africa.
Endemism is the ecological state of a species being unique to a defined geographic location, such as an island, nation, country or other defined zone, or habitat type; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. The extreme opposite of endemism is cosmopolitan distribution. An alternative term for a species that is endemic is precinctive, which applies to species that are restricted to a defined geographical area.
Hawaii is a state of the United States of America. It is the only state located in the Pacific Ocean and the only state composed entirely of islands.
This plant is a liana which climbs into the surrounding trees, reaching a maximum length of 20 meters. [1] [3] A study found the average length of the vine to be 2.6 meters, with a maximum of 12.5 meters in the sample. The vine also branches and climbs in different directions. It may spread along the ground or over detritus for a few meters before climbing upward, but plants were observed climbing 8 meters up into the canopy. [4] The leaves are 10 to 13 centimeters long and are made up of several pairs of leaflets each measuring up to 7 centimeters long by 3 wide. The leaves have tendrils at their tips. The plant produces inflorescences of 6 to 9 flowers with curving corollas up to 3 centimeters long. The flowers are yellowish white turning rose-pink with maturity and then purplish with age. The fruit is a black legume pod 9 or 10 centimeters long containing spherical black seeds. [3]
A liana is any of various long-stemmed, woody vines that are rooted in the soil at ground level and use trees, as well as other means of vertical support, to climb up to the canopy to get access to well-lit areas of the forest. Lianas are characteristic of tropical moist deciduous forests, but may be found in temperate rainforests. There are also temperate lianas, for example the members of the Clematis or Vitis genera. Lianas can form bridges amidst the forest canopy, providing arboreal animals with paths across the forest. These bridges can protect weaker trees from strong winds. Lianas compete with forest trees for sunlight, water and nutrients from the soil. Forests without lianas grow 150% more fruit; trees with lianas have twice the probability of dying.
In botany, a tendril is a specialized stem, leaves or petiole with a threadlike shape that is used by climbing plants for support, attachment and cellular invasion by parasitic plants, generally by twining around suitable hosts found by touch. They do not have a lamina or blade, but they can photosynthesize. They can be formed from modified shoots, modified leaves, or auxiliary branches and are sensitive to chemicals, often determining the direction of growth, as in species of Cuscuta.
An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed. The modifications can involve the length and the nature of the internodes and the phyllotaxis, as well as variations in the proportions, compressions, swellings, adnations, connations and reduction of main and secondary axes. Inflorescence can also be defined as the reproductive portion of a plant that bears a cluster of flowers in a specific pattern.
The flowers are visited by the ʻiʻiwi (Vestiaria coccinea) and the ʻamakihi (Loxops virens virens), two species of Hawaiian honeycreepers. [4] The shape and color of the flowers suggest they may be pollinated by birds. [1]
Hawaiian honeycreepers are small, passerine birds endemic to Hawaiʻi. They are closely related to the rosefinches in the genus Carpodacus. Their great morphological diversity is the result of adaptive radiation in an insular environment.
Pollination is the transfer of pollen from a male part of a plant to a female part of a plant, later enabling fertilisation and the production of seeds, most often by an animal or by wind. Pollinating agents are animals such as insects, birds, and bats; water; wind; and even plants themselves, when self-pollination occurs within a closed flower. Pollination often occurs within a species. When pollination occurs between species it can produce hybrid offspring in nature and in plant breeding work.
This plant was first collected in 1794 by Archibald Menzies on Mauna Loa. It has also been collected from Mauna Kea, but it does not appear to occur there anymore. [1] As of 1980 the total global population was made up of three colonies in an area one kilometer long on Mauna Loa. [4] There are only 15 to 50 individuals in total. [2]
Archibald Menzies was a Scottish surgeon, botanist and naturalist. He spent many years at sea, serving with the Royal Navy, private merchants, and the Vancouver Expedition. He was the first recorded European to reach the summit of the Hawaiian volcano Mauna Loa and introduced the Monkey Puzzle tree to England.
Mauna Loa is one of five volcanoes that form the Island of Hawaii in the U.S. state of Hawaiʻi in the Pacific Ocean. The largest subaerial volcano in both mass and volume, Mauna Loa has historically been considered the largest volcano on Earth, dwarfed only by Tamu Massif. It is an active shield volcano with relatively gentle slopes, with a volume estimated at approximately 18,000 cubic miles (75,000 km3), although its peak is about 125 feet (38 m) lower than that of its neighbor, Mauna Kea. Lava eruptions from Mauna Loa are silica-poor and very fluid, and they tend to be non-explosive.
Mauna Kea is a dormant volcano on the island of Hawaii. Its peak is 4,207.3 m (13,803 ft) above sea level, making it the highest point in the state of Hawaii. Most of the volcano is underwater, and when measured from its underwater base, Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain in the world, measuring over 10,000 m (33,000 ft) in height. Mauna Kea is about a million years old, and has thus passed the most active shield stage of life hundreds of thousands of years ago. In its current post-shield state, its lava is more viscous, resulting in a steeper profile. Late volcanism has also given it a much rougher appearance than its neighboring volcanoes due to construction of cinder cones, decentralization of its rift zones, glaciation on its peak, and weathering by the prevailing trade winds. Mauna Kea last erupted 6,000 to 4,000 years ago and is now considered dormant. The peak is about 38 m (125 ft) higher than Mauna Loa, its more massive neighbor.
This species was depicted on a U.S. commemorative stamp issued on June 7, 1979. [5]
