Aechmea matudae: A Survivor in its Natural Habitat by Robert Guess and Virginia Guess in J Brom Soc 52(5): 210-213. 2002
Although the inventory of Bromeliaceae in Chiapas, Mexico, is small in comparison to other Neotropical regions, the occasional discovery of a species hidden away in an isolated pocket fuels our interest in this state. Not always new, more often just forgotten or known only from the original holotype, to bring such a species forward once again is reward enough. When needing to return to take a second and even third look at the plant to reaffirm the identification, the plant takes on even greater significance, especially when the environment in which it exists is not always the most comfortable to visit. This is the situation we confronted with Aechmea matudae L.B. Smith, an elusive endemic species that we believe grows only in a small circumscribed area of the Soconusco, the Pacific Coastal Plain of Chiapas.
The first photograph of the species to appear in the Journal of the Bromeliad Society served as one example of Eizi Matuda's contributions to the Bromeliaceae of Chiapas (Guess and Guess 2001). When our identification of this species in the article raised some question, we revisited the original collection site in order to procure a flowering specimen for further verification. We subsequently sent plant material to the Mulford B. Foster Bromeliad Identification Center at Marie Selby Botanical Gardens where the plant was confirmed as A. matudae, a species that closely resembles Aechmea castelnavii Baker.
Aechmea matudae is noteworthy for its long, armored leaves and vivid pink scape bracts. Because of the size and length of leaves, some over one meter long, this epiphytic Aechmea requires tall, sturdy trees for support, primarily those with relatively small leaves to filter intense sunlight. The green berries and lavender petals that develop from November through January are similar to those of A. castelnavii, a species not known to grow north of Costa Rica. At the end of the dry season in May, the berries turn deep reddish-purple, almost black, as they do in A. castelnavii. The spines (mucros) on the sepals of A. matudae, often over seven millimeters long, however, are a distinguishing characteristic.
The species appears to be environmentally sensitive and difficult to grow when removed from its natural habitat. This small niche located in the municipality of Acacoyagua lies in the center of the Soconusco, a narrow plain formed by the steep mountains of the Sierra Madre de Chiapas on one side, and dense mangrove swamps on the ocean side. The Soconusco stretches over two hundred kilometers from the small town of Pijijiapan to the border between Mexico and Guatemala. A vast network of small tributaries channels water from the high mountains into larger rivers that flow into the Pacific Ocean. In the rainy season, these rivers often burst over their banks to flood adjacent low-lying areas.
With the abundant water supply that sustains a persistent evergreen vegetation, the region historically has provided an advantageous edge for farming. At the end of the nineteenth century, this fertile lowland attracted many immigrants, including a small colony from Japan who settled in the pueblo of Acacoyagua. Eizi Matuda (1894-1978), who migrated in 1922 to join this Japanese agricultural colony, first described A. matudae after finding it in the environs of his finca, a few kilometers from Acacoyagua. When he relocated to Mexico City in the 1940s, his former land was gradually subdivided into small parcels, and much of it cleared for cattle grazing.
Today four large neighboring fincas, all established in the early 1900s and still occupied by descendants of the original families who first settled them, surround the property once owned by Professor Matuda. Access to these private fincas is difficult and requires a network of communication with local people. By making several fortuitous contacts, we were able to explore one where many original groves of large trees remain, locally called Guanacaste and Guachipilfn. Here, in January 2001, we discovered an isolated population of well over five hundred plants of A. matudae thriving on these trees.
In addition to A. matudae, the relatively sparse inventory of Bromeliaceae on this finca includes Catopsis nutans (Swartz) Grisebach, both pistillate and staminate plants, Tillandsia utriculata Linnaeus, Tillandsia dasyliriifolia Baker, Tillandsia caput-medusae E. Morren, Tillandsia schiedeana Steudel, Tillandsia concolor L.B. Smith, and Bromelia karatas Linnaeus. By far, A. matudae is the most abundant species. This property, bordered by two tributaries that converge to flow into a major river just beyond the boundaries, was once the site of a PreHispanic settlement, and then later a Spanish colonial town that was occupied from 1572 to 1767 (Gasco 1989).
With its year-round water supply, the site offered an ideal location along a Pre-Columbian trade route from Guatemala to the Central Valley of Mexico. Caravans of goods, including large amounts of cacao, could cross the two smaller streams year round, when the larger river beyond was impassable. Today it provides A. matudae an advantageous habitat at an elevation of 160 meters with high temperatures and humidity from the year-round moisture of the riverine environs. The owner of this cattle-dairy ranch of approximately one hundred and fifty hectares, maintained within the same family for three generations, has conscientiously attempted to preserve some of the natural vegetation, and indirectly provided a favorable habitat for A. matudae.
When we returned here in late June 2002, in order to verify the color of the berries and collect a sample of seeds, we were able to visit the adjacent cattle fincas where we found less favorable conditions and very few specimens of A. matudae. Most of the larger trees that the plants depend on had been removed in order to increase grazing land or replaced with large, densely leafed mango trees. Although Eizi Matuda lived in an area rich in Pre-Columbian and colonial history, it was the unusual botanical features of Chiapas that attracted him throughout his lifetime. Early in his plant collecting forays, he recognized that Chiapas formed a transitional zone between Mexican and Central American flora. Years later, Dennis Breedlove (1981) described the various physiographic regions of this state including the distinctive flora of each, and identified the characteristics that distinguish it as a unique floristic zone. One of these features is the significant number of plant genera that reach their southernmost and northernmost limits here, including some endemic species of Bromeliaceae. Matuda identified several of these endemics, one of which was A. matudae, known up to now only from specimens in herbaria. Today the survival of this species appears to depend on the largess of a single finca owner who recognizes the importance of preserving a segment of the natural surroundings. Within its borders, the state of Chiapas may hold many more unexplored areas with yet to be discovered or verified species of Bromeliaceae. Because of the difficulty in gaining entry to some of these areas as well as the relatively small numbers of plants, it has drawn little attention in recent years. Although extensive work in Chiapas has been done on the genus Tillandsia, other genera have been almost ignored. It is possible that without further investigation, relatively unknown species, such as A. matudae, could be lost or placed in synonymy with more widely distributed and better-known species. Some haste in such endeavors is necessary as the destruction and modification of the natural environment continue here at an alarming pace. —SeeSmith & Downs 1979
