Lichenology in Africa

Abstract

In the past three years The Lichenologist has published c. 90 papers but only four of these were based on African material. Two of these were physiological papers co-authored by one of us (RB), whereas the other two were taxonomic and described new species from South Africa and Kenya. This contrasts dramatically with the 31 papers based on European material. Given the relative sizes of the continents and the diversity of habitats in Africa – from Mediterranean biomes in the north and far south, through deserts, tropical rainforests and savannah to temperate biomes in the south, and from sea level to alpine regions – this is an exceedingly poor return. Even within Africa, the distribution is uneven with three of the four papers being based on South African material, one on Kenyan, and none on western or northern material. The history of lichenology in Africa dates back at least as far as Linnaeus. Johann König, a pupil of Linnaeus, visited Cape Town on his way to India in 1768 and made several collections, including the type collection of Lichen chrysophtalmos (Linnaeus 1771), which we now know as Teloschistes chrysophthalmos [as chrysophthalmus]. However, the first collector to spend any time collecting lichens in southern Africa was Carl Pehr Thunberg between 1772–1775 who, although based in Cape Town, travelled extensively in the interior (Thunberg 1794). In the following 150 years, a number of local collectors became active, including Miss [Olivia?] Armstrong and Peter MacOwen, while European visitors such as Josef Brunnthaler and Friedrich Wilms made extensive expeditions into the interior. Their collections were, of course, taken back to Europe and deposited in European herbaria (LUND, G, W, ZT, etc) and many were described as new species by Johannes Müller (1885–1888), Edvard Vainio (e.g. Vainio 1901, 1926), Alexander Zahlbruckner (e.g. Zahlbruckner 1926, 1932, 1936) and especially Ernst Stizenberger in his Lichenaea Africana (Stizenberger 1890, 1891). These early collectors were primarily botanists who also collected other groups and more details of their activities can be found on the Biographical Database of Southern African Science (http:// www.s2a3.org.za/bio/Main.php). In the early 20th century Paul Andries van der Byl collected lichens extensively (van der Byl 1933a, b, 1935a, b), and in 1950 Ethel Doidge included lichens in her monumental compendium of southern African fungi (Doidge 1950). Subsequently, between 1956–1991, Ove Almborn issued six fascicles (150 collections) of an exsiccate, Lichenes Africani, and also published several other papers on African lichens (Almborn 1966, 1987, 1988, 1989). However, the first person based in South Africa to concentrate on the lichens of southern Africa was Franklin Brusse of SANBI, Pretoria who, between 1984–1994, published c. 40 papers describing taxonomic novelties from South Africa and Namibia. Although his main interest was in Parmelia s. lat., describing numerous new species and making many new combinations, he also described many new species and nine new genera across a wide range of families (e.g. Brusse 1985a, b, 1987a, b, c, d, 1988a, b, 1994). More recently, one of us (AF) has published an updated checklist of South African lichens (Fryday 2015). Luciana Zedda and co-workers have carried out some important work on terricolous lichen communities in Namibia and NW South Africa (e.g. Zedda & Rambold 2009; Zedda et al. 2009, 2011a, b) but otherwise the ecology of southern African lichens is poorly studied. Lichenological exploration in eastern Africa started in the mid-1800s, with collectors mainly comprised of explorers, missionaries and European visitors with an interest in nature. The earliest collector in the region is perhaps W. G. Schimper who collected in Ethiopia in the 1840s. Other personalities who made small lichen collections from different parts of East Africa in the late part of the 19th century were Marquess Antinori, O. Beccari, J. Hannington, J. M. Hildebrandt, R. L. von Hohnel, C. H. E. W. Holst, H. H. Johnstone, W. Last, H. Meyer and G. Thomson, who made collections in Tanzania and Zanzibar. Prince Heinrich of Liechtenstein, Dr Pospischill and A. K. Ritter collected in Kenya and Tanzania and G. F. Scott Elliot collected in the Ruwenzori Mountains in Uganda. These collections were reported in several works (Baglietto 1875; Krempelhuber 1877; Stirton 1877–1878; Jatta 1882; Müller 1885–1888, 1890, 1893, 1894; Stein 1889; Steiner 1897; Vainio 1898). In the early 1900s, collectors comprised both amateur and professional botanists. Amongst these were J. Brunnthaler, B. Fink, L. Hauman, G. Lindau, R. A. Maas Geesteranus, Józef Motyka, Vicomte de Poncins, R. Pichi Sermolli, Professor Senni, B. Schroder, R. Wettstein and the Reverend Fathers of Consolata Missions. Results of these collections were published in several papers (Jatta 1908, 1909; Lindau 1911; Hue 1916; Zahlbruckner 1926, 1932; Zahlbruckner & Hauman 1936; Cengia Sambo 1937, 1938, 1939; Maas Geesteranus 1955; Motyka 1961) and later summarized in treatments of tropical lichens from Africa by Carroll Dodge (1953, 1956, 1957, 1959, 1964, 1971). In the 1970s, Hildur Krog and Dougal Swinscow collected intensively in East Africa, their collections culminating in the publication of ‘Macrolichen Flora of East Africa’ (Swinscow & Krog 1988). Subsequent excursions by other lichenologists greatly increased the knowledge of the East African lichen biota (Sérusiaux 1978, 1979, 1981, 1984a, b, 1989; Ahti et al. 1987; Almborn 1989; Elix 2002; Lücking & Kalb 2002; Jørgensen 2003; Kalb 2004, 2007, 2008; Alstrup & Aptroot 2005; Killmann & Fischer 2005; Sérusiaux & Diederich 2005; Frisch et al. 2006; Sérusiaux et al. 2006; Bock et al. 2007; Yeshitela 2008; Archer et al. 2009; Frisch & Tibell 2010). For the last two decades one of us (PK) has been collecting in Kenya and has updated the Kenyan lichen checklist, which will soon be published.