Gunter A. Fischer

Gunter A. Fischer
Missouri Botanical Garden · Science & Conservation

PhD

About

91
Publications
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3,071
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Publications

Publications (91)
Article
Two new species of Bulbophyllum Thouars, B. psittacinum Verlynde & Ramand. and B. vespertilioides Verlynde & Ramand. (Orchidaceae), are recognized and described. Both species are endemic to Madagascar and were found in the Ankerana forest, part of the Ankeniheny-Zahamena corridor (CAZ) protected area in the eastern escarpment forests. These two spe...
Book
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The Tai Po Kau Forest Dynamics Plot was established in 2015 following standard ForestGEO protocols. It is located within the core area of Tai Po Kau Nature Reserve in the New Territories of Hong Kong S.A.R., China. The plot measures 500 m by 400 m (i.e. 20 hectares, ha) and, in the first census completed in 2015, it contained 81,019 individuals of...
Article
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As socio-ecological systems of high conservation value, sacred groves are subject to intense competing interests worldwide. Hong Kong’s fung shui woodlands (FSW) are an ancient form of sacred grove derived from old-growth forest fragments protected for geomantic beliefs relating to their proximity to traditional villages and subsequently modified t...
Article
Integration of the world's natural history collections can provide a resource for decision-makers.
Article
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Over the past three centuries, people have collected objects and specimens and placed them in natural history museums throughout the world. Taken as a whole, this global collection is the physical basis for our understanding of the natural world and our place in it, an unparalleled source of information that is directly relevant to issues as divers...
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Anthropogenic disturbance has led to widespread clearance and degradation of tropical forests, and tree planting has been promoted as an effective solution for recovery. However, trees have been overwhelmingly planted in monocultures or low-diversity mixes and this is expected to have profound, lasting impacts on forest structure, diversity, and fu...
Article
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One third of chondrichthyan species (sharks, rays, and chimeras) are threatened with extinction, mainly due to unsustainable fishing. Large accessible international markets for meat and luxury products like dried fins can help drive overfishing by encouraging targeted capture or retention of high-value export species. If this is common, then specie...
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Evolutionary slowdowns in diversification have been inferred in various plant and animal lineages. Investigation based on diversification models integrated with environmental factors and key characters could provide critical insights into this diversification trend. We evaluate diversification rates in the Cirrhopetalum alliance (Bulbophyllum, Orch...
Article
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Many species in the lowland forest of the Indo-Chinese tropical and subtropical region have lost a substantial amount of suitable habitat due to both historical and contemporary anthropogenic activities. Therefore, conservation programmes that aim to restore or re-establish populations need to consider the species’ rencent past range as well as its...
Article
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Despite growing evidence that niche shifts are more common in flowering plants than previously thought, little is known of whether such shifts are promoted by changes in photosynthetic pathways. Here we combine the most complete phylogeny for epiphytic Malagasy Bulbophyllum orchids (c. 210 spp.) with climatic niche and carbon isotope ratios to infe...
Article
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Six new species: Bulbophyllum caniceps, B. cochinealloides, B. fierenanaense, B. geminiflorum, B. oenanthum and B. rudolphus are described for the first time. The identity and nomenclature of Bulbophyllum cylindrocarpum is discussed and its var. andringitrense is recognised at species rank as B. jeanbosseri . Bulbophyllum aubrevillei and B. kieneri...
Article
Catastrophic degradation of forests is ongoing worldwide and leads to severe forest fragmentation. Restoration plantings are often necessary to restore fragmented forests, complementing the limited natural regeneration. High genetic diversity is critical for the long-term viability of restored forests. However, there is limited knowledge of whether...
Preprint
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Introductory paragraph Despite growing evidence that niche shifts are more common in flowering plants than previously thought, still little is known about the key physiological (e.g. photosynthesis) traits underlying such niche shifts. To address this question, we here combine a comprehensively sampled phylogeny for mostly epiphytic Malagasy Bulbop...
Article
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ForestGEO is a network of scientists and long-term forest dynamics plots (FDPs) spanning the Earth's major forest types. ForestGEO's mission is to advance understanding of the diversity and dynamics of forests and to strengthen global capacity for forest science research. ForestGEO is unique among forest plot networks in its large-scale plot dimens...
Article
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Forests are already and will continue to experience a rapid and extreme change in climatic conditions in the future. The distributions of forests are expected to shift northward and to higher altitudes based on the results of species distribution modelling (SDM). Although SDM is criticized for lack of biotic interactions and natural migration mecha...
Article
Tropical forests are the main reservoirs for global biodiversity and climate control. As secondary forests are now more widespread than primary forests, understanding their functioning and role in the biosphere is increasingly important. This includes understanding how they achieve stability, how they accumulate species and build biodiversity and h...
Article
https://www.resurgence.org/magazine/article5560-gardening-for-the-earth.html
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Legumes provide an essential service to ecosystems by capturing nitrogen from the atmosphere and delivering it to the soil, where it may then be available to other plants. However, this facilitation by legumes has not been widely studied in global tropical forests. Demographic data from 11 large forest plots (16–60 ha) ranging from 5.25° S to 29.25...
Article
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To track the illegal pangolin trade from Africa to Asia, we analyzed 1800 DNA samples from 30 seizures of African pangolin scales in Hong Kong during the period 2012–2016. We concluded that all four African pangolin species were present in trade, and that the white-bellied pangolin (Phataginus tricuspis) appeared most frequently (88.5%) in our samp...
Article
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There is an urgent need for population‐specific trade information for overexploited sharks, as international trade regulations are becoming an important tool for their conservation [i.e., listings on the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES)]. We tested a genetic stock identification (GSI) workflow to quantify the relative...
Article
Didymoplexiella laosensis is described as a new species from the limestone mountains of Vang Vieng District in central Laos. A detailed description, colour plate, line drawings and conservation assessment are provided, together with morphological comparisons with three allied species in tropical Asia, namely, D. ornata, D. siamensis and D. trichech...
Article
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Background: Gene flow in plants via pollen and seeds is asymmetrical at different geographic scales. Orchid seeds are adapted to long-distance wind dispersal but pollinium transfer is often influenced by pollinator behavior. We combined field studies with an analysis of genetic diversity among 155 physically mapped adults and 1105 F1 seedlings to...
Article
The Cirrhopetalum alliance is a loosely circumscribed species-rich group within the mega-diverse genus Bulbophyllum (Orchidaceae). The monophyletic status of the alliance has been challenged by previous studies, although established sectional classifications have yet to be tested in a phylogenetic context. We used maximum likelihood and Bayesian an...
Article
Typhoons of varying intensities severely impact ecosystem functioning in tropical regions and their increasing frequencies and intensities due to global warming pose new challenges for effective forest restoration. This study examines the impact of a super-typhoon (Mangkhut) on the regenerating native secondary forest and exotic monocultural planta...
Article
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The international fin trade is a major source of mortality for many threatened shark species but most of what it is known about this trade comes from assessments of large fins commanding high prices in trade hubs. There is growing international trade in ‘small, low‐value’ fins in Southeast Asia, which are used for inexpensive shark fin soup product...
Article
Whether wind pollination in trees can offset the negative genetic consequences of anthropogenic forest fragmentation is not clearly established. To answer this question, we examined the demographic genetics of Quercus bambusifolia over a 70-year recovery period in highly fragmented forests in Hong Kong. We sampled 1138 individuals from 37 locations...
Article
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Climate is widely recognised as an important determinant of the latitudinal diversity gradient. However, most existing studies make no distinction between direct and indirect effects of climate, which substantially hinders our understanding of how climate constrains biodiversity globally. Using data from 35 large forest plots, we test hypothesised...
Article
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Climate is widely recognised as an important determinant of the latitudinal diversity gradient. However, most existing studies make no distinction between direct and indirect effects of climate, which substantially hinders our understanding of how climate constrains biodiversity globally. Using data from 35 large forest plots, we test hypothesised...
Article
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Overharvesting is one of the greatest threats to species survival. Farming overharvested species is a conservation strategy that can meet growing market demand and conserve wild populations of the target species. This strategy is compatible with the international community's desire to uphold the right of local communities to use biological resource...
Article
Cleisostoma schoenorchaefolium is described as a new species from limestone karst in Lao PDR. A detailed description with photographs, line drawings and a conservation assessment are presented. Due to the presence of a combination of unique characters (namely, semi-terete leaves with a subulate apex, a two-chambered spur and a complex pollinarium s...
Article
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Ten new distribution records of plants to Hong Kong (Published in Guihaia = Guangxi Zhiwu)
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Trade‐driven overexploitation threatens many sharks. Twelve of the world's most vulnerable shark species have been listed on the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) to regulate internationally traded products such as meat and dried fins. CITES records indicate that Hong Kong was the world's top le...
Article
Aim To examine the contribution of large‐diameter trees to biomass, stand structure, and species richness across forest biomes. Location Global. Time period Early 21st century. Major taxa studied Woody plants. Methods We examined the contribution of large trees to forest density, richness and biomass using a global network of 48 large (from 2 t...
Article
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Threats to orchid survival continue to intensify, with > 50% of the orchids that have been assessed for the IUCN Global Red List falling in to one of the categories of threat. Despite the best efforts of the orchid conservation community, the capacity to develop solutions at the species-level will be outstripped by the sheer scale and pace of chang...
Article
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With limited resources for curtailing the escalating biodiversity crisis, a rational means of setting priorities among threatened species is of pre-eminent concern. Combining phylogenetic history and conservation status to estimate the evolutionary distinctiveness that would be lost in the event of a given species becoming extinct has gained moment...
Article
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The following nine new additions to the orchid flora of Laos PDR are reported based on surveys in the country conducted during the period 2012–2017: Bulbophyllum alcicorne, B. meson, Coelogyne suaveolens, Cyrtosia nana, Dendrobium phuketense, Oberonia rhizoides, Phaius columnaris, Thelasis khasiana and Zeuxine longilabris. The taxonomy of a further...
Article
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The shark fin trade is a major driver of shark exploitation in fisheries all over the world, most of which are not managed on a species‐specific basis. Species‐specific trade information highlights taxa of particular concern and can be used to assess the efficacy of management measures and anticipate emerging threats. The species composition of the...
Article
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Thismia nigricoronata is described as a new species in family Burmanniaceae. Both morphological and phylogenetic analyses indicate that this new Lao endemic is allied to T. taiwanensis in section Glaziocharis, and it can be differentiated on the basis of its longer vestigial stem leaves, reflexed free outer perianth lobes and ornamented, vibrantly...
Poster
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Herblabel is an R package under the GNU GPL-2 license. It uses template based on Darwin Core and CVH5.0 exchange standards to generated labels for herbarium specimens. Main functions are: herbarium_label, annotation_label and fill_dwc. The labels are in Rich Text Format (RTF), which is very convenient to be viewed and edited using MS word. herblabe...
Article
Landscape metrics have often been used to analyse the spatial dynamics of habitat fragmentation accompanying forest loss. However, there are few studies of the spatial dynamics of natural forest succession, especially over periods longer than the operational period of imaging satellites. This study applies spatial metrics to understand the spatial...
Article
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Bulbophyllum jingdongense, a new species from South China and Laos belonging to the Cirrhopetalum alliance (Orchidaceae), is described and illustrated. It is morphologically distinct from all other known species in the alliance on account of the following diagnostic characters: pseudobulbs compressed subglobose; sepals and petals with dense, reddis...
Article
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Vegetative propagation (clonal growth) conveys several evolutionary advantages that positively affect life history fitness and is a widespread phenomenon among angiosperms that also reproduce sexually. However, a bias towards clonality can interfere with sexual reproduction and lead to sexual extinction, although a dearth of effective genetic tools...
Article
Impacts of extreme climate events on terrestrial ecosystems are more severe than those due to normal climate variability, and IPCC expects extreme weather events to become more frequent, triggering a gradual or unexpected change in forest ecosystems. Secondary forest in Hong Kong is recovering through natural succession since 1945, after complete d...
Article
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Voucher specimens are essential for plant taxonomy, ecology, and plant molecular biology. Collection and identification information should be clearly, accurately and formally printed on herbarium labels, without confusion or spelling mistakes. During the preparation of the labels, data entry should be straight-forward and easy to manage. Ideally, t...
Article
Full-text available
Voucher specimens are essential for plant taxonomy, ecology, and plant molecular biology. Collection and identification information should be clearly, accurately and formally printed on herbarium labels, without confusion or spelling mistakes. During the preparation of the labels, data entry should be straight-forward and easy to manage. Ideally, t...
Article
Full-text available
Background Species or clades may retain or shift their environmental niche space over evolutionary time. Understanding these processes offers insights into the environmental processes fuelling lineage diversification and might also provide information on past range dynamics of ecosystems. However, little is known about the relative contributions of...
Article
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A major project to study the phytodiversity of the Indo-Burma Biodiversity Hotspot was initiated by Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden, Hong Kong, in 2011, with the aim of surveying primary forest fragments and identifying conservation priorities within this expansive but highly threatened ecoregion. The Vang Vieng area of Vientiane Province, norther...
Article
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A project to study the phytodiversity of the Indo-Burma Biodiversity Hotspot (IBBH) was initiated by Kadoorie Farm and Botanic Garden, Hong Kong, in 2011, with the aim of surveying primary forest fragments and identifying conservation priorities within this expansive but highly threatened ecoregion. Vang Vieng District of Vientiane Province, northe...
Article
Bulbophyllum occultum, an epiphytic orchid mainly distributed in the rainforests of (north)eastern Madagascar and La Réunion, represents an interesting model case for testing the effects of anthropogenic vs historical (e.g., climate induced) habitat isolation and long-distance colonization on the genetic structure of plant species with disjunct dis...
Article
Forested areas of the world decreased by 129 million hectare during the past quarter-century, and only 35 % of remainder is primary forest. Secondary forests are therefore relatively more important for biodiversity conservation, catchment protection, climate control, and the ecological services they provide. Many governments expend large resources...
Article
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Background The transition from outcrossing to selfing has long been portrayed as an ‘evolutionary dead end’ because, first, reversals are unlikely and, second, selfing lineages suffer from higher rates of extinction owing to a reduced potential for adaptation and the accumulation of deleterious mutations. We tested these two predictions in a clade...
Article
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Despite being protected by both international and national regulations, pangolins are threatened by illegal trade. Here we report mitochondrial DNA identification and haplotype richness estimation, using 239 pangolin scale samples from two confiscations in Hong Kong. We found a total of 13 genetically distinct cytochrome c oxidase I (COI) haplotype...
Article
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http://www.sciencemag.org/content/348/6232/291.summary?rss=1
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Global change is impacting forests worldwide, threatening biodiversity and ecosystem services including climate regulation. Understanding how forests respond is critical to forest conservation and climate protection. This review describes an international network of 59 long-term forest dynamics research sites (CTFS-ForestGEO) useful for characteriz...
Article
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The epiphytic orchid Bulbophyllum ambrosia bears solitary, sweet-smelling, nectariferous flowers that attract honeybees in considerable numbers, but it is self-incompatible, making fruit-set in the wild infrequent. Even so, the species is relatively abundant throughout its range in Asia. The species is described and illustrated and its taxonomic hi...
Article
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The transition from outcrossing to self-fertilization is one of the most common evolutionary changes in angiosperms. The orchid family exemplifies this evolutionary trend but, because of a general lack of large-scale surveys on auto-pollination in orchid taxa, the incidence and modes of auto-pollination among (sub)tropical orchids remain poorly kno...
Data
Table S1. List of 208 individual accessions of 29 Bulbophyllum clade C species (sects. Calamaria, Bifalcula, Humblotiorchis) from the Madagascan region, including information on the Botanical Garden University of Salzburg (HBS) or Vienna (HBV) cultivation and/or voucher numbers, sources, number of flowers surveyed for gynostemium structure, treatme...
Article
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The ephemeral, leafless orchids Didymoplexiella siamensis and Gastrodia peichatieniana are newly recorded from Hong Kong. A lectotype is selected for the former, and the recently described D. denticulata from southern Vietnam is reduced to its synonymy. Full descriptions and global conservation assessments are presented for these hitherto poorly kn...