Wild Plant Species in Egyptian Gardens of the Nile Region: Conservation Viewpoint

Abstract

T HE PRESENT study aims to evaluate the role of Egyptian gardens in the Nile Region for wild plant conservation, focusing on threatened species. For this evaluation, an outline of their life forms, geographical distributions, economic uses, environmental benefits, conservation categories, and local threats in their natural habitats is given. One hundred and ninety-four trips were conducted to cover 183 gardens in the study area (summer 2012 to winter 2018). Ninetysix species were recorded, they belonged to 76 genera and 43 families. Fabaceae was the most recorded family and Acacia was the most represented genus. Phanerophytes was the most represented life form (39.6%). Nile region was the most represented (75 species, 78.1%) (out of them 20 species were restricted to it). Beside, 21 species were conserved in gardens from other phytogeographical regions as Sinai, Mediterranean, Gebal Elba and Deserts. Medicinal plants (58 species) were the most represented economic uses, while nitrogen fixers (37.9%) were the most represented environmental benefits. Eighty-seven species suffer from at least one threat at their natural habitats, over-collecting species (70.1%) were the most represented threats. The recorded species classified into 73 native and 23 aliens. Seven species were IUCN threatened species (5 least concerned, 1 endangered and 1 vulnerable). Our results show an unlimited role of botanic and public gardens in the Egyptian Nile Region; for plant diversity conservation, as they not only help conserve the threatened species in the study area but also help conserve wild plant species from other geographical regions.

Cultural Importance Indices of the Endemic Plants in Egypt

“…Ethnobotany is known as the interactions study between plants and humans; however, the current use of this description implicit the study of native or traditional uses of plants. It includes the indigenous knowledge of plant classification, cultivation, and use as food, medicine and shelter, especially ethnomedicinal knowledge related to many drug industries (Faruque et al, 2018;Ahmed et al, 2020). Prance et al (1987) preferred using the expression "quantitative ethnobotany".…”

Remotely Identification and Differentiate of Some Family Fabaceae Species in Antoniadis Garden Using Spectral Reflectance Measurements

“…Floristic diversity is essential for life on Earth, especially in providing stability in ecological crucial (Cunningham et al, 2015). According to (Boulos 2005, 2009, Shaltout and Eid 2010and Ahmed et al, 2020, Egypt had an important area of plant diversity and contains about 28.8% of the threatened plants of North Africa where it has more than 2145 species and approximately 220 subspecies. One of the most important and widespread plant groups in Egypt belongs to family Leguminosae (Fabaceae), where it is the third-largest family of angiosperms (flowering plants) with 770 genera and 19500 species (LEWIS et al, 2005 andLPWG, 2017).…”