High in the Ecuadorian Andes, above 4,100 metres where the air is thin and the nights fall below freezing, a little-known genus of cushion-forming mallows has just received its most complete conservation reckoning to date. A new study published in the Biodiversity Data Journal presents official assessments for all five accepted species of Nototriche in Ecuador, proposing that two of them be listed as Critically Endangered, two as Endangered and one as Vulnerable. For three of the five species, including the most recently described member of the genus, this is the first time they have been formally assessed through the IUCN Red List process.
The genus Nototriche belongs to the mallow family, Malvaceae, and is distributed along the Andes from Ecuador in the north to Argentina in the south, possibly reaching Colombian páramos. Its species are herbs, prostrate shrubs or cushions that form rosettes of basal leaves, sometimes with woody stems, and they produce solitary flowers and schizocarp fruits densely covered in indumentum. In Ecuador, all five species are endemic to the country and grow only at high altitudes, between 4,100 and 5,000 metres, in grass páramo and the superpáramo, the uppermost páramo belt just below the permanent snowline, characterised by open, discontinuous vegetation over rock, sand and cryoturbated soils.
The research team, which began a systematic project on the genus in 2023, carried out field trips throughout the páramos of Ecuador, sampling all the species, making new collections and updating the genus’s distribution in the country. They combined this fieldwork with distribution data from three Ecuadorian herbaria, QCA, QCNE and HA, and occurrence records from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Using QGIS for mapping and GeoCAT for geospatial analysis, they estimated the extent of occurrence and area of occupancy for each species and applied the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria to assign threat categories.
The results mark a significant shift from previous knowledge. Earlier national evaluations, by Chanco and Ulloa-Ulloa in 2004 and by León-Yánez and colleagues in 2011, had recognised four species for the country and categorised N. ecuadoriensis and N. hartwegii as Endangered, and N. jamesonii and N. phyllanthos as Least Concern. Neither of those evaluations was ever processed through the official IUCN Red List, and both relied solely on herbarium specimens and previously published collection data, without updated field sampling or spatial analyses. The only officially registered assessments for Ecuadorian Nototriche on the IUCN Red List website dated from 2004.
The most alarming finding concerns Nototriche antisanensis, the most recently described species of the genus for Ecuador, described in 2025. It is known only from its type locality at Antisanilla Peak around Antisana volcano, in the Antisana Ecological Reserve, at 4,325 metres. The researchers estimated an extent of occurrence of just 0.03 square kilometres and an area of occupancy of 8.00 square kilometres, with a single location and fewer than 50 mature individuals. On this basis, they assessed the species as Critically Endangered under criteria B2ab(iii) plus D, noting that although the area is not heavily visited and lies within a government protected reserve, the tiny population is extremely fragile and could decline rapidly as a result of land-cover changes driven by land-use and climate threats.
Nototriche ecuadoriensis, previously listed as Endangered, was also proposed for Critically Endangered status, under criterion C2a(i). The species is recorded from only two localities, on the western slopes of Antisana volcano and within the Cayambe-Coca National Park, separated by roughly 20 kilometres, with an extent of occurrence of 243.50 square kilometres and an area of occupancy of 16.00 square kilometres. The population trend is a decline based on direct observation: at the type locality, no individuals were found at the coordinates where the species was originally described, and subpopulations in Cayambe-Coca National Park have declined, with individuals replaced by other herbaceous plants. The subpopulation on the western flank of Antisana appears stable, probably because it is in an area with difficult access. Fewer than 50 mature individuals are predicted for each subpopulation, and the subpopulations are severely fragmented.
Nototriche hartwegii, the most widely distributed species of the genus in the country, was assessed as Endangered under criterion B2ab(iii). It occurs in five fragmented locations from southern to northern Ecuador, including Cajas National Park, the páramos of Ozogoche and Quispicacha in the central Andes, and Imbabura volcano in the north, with an extent of occurrence of 10,492 square kilometres and an area of occupancy of 28.00 square kilometres. The researchers estimated fewer than 100 mature individuals and found that the subpopulations are severely fragmented, separated by approximately 93.03 to 165.19 kilometres, a distance that makes gene flow technically impossible. Four of the five localities lie inside protected areas, but the northern locality has no protection scheme, and the team observed a decline in the quality and area of the habitat due to the expansion of the agricultural frontier, farming and road building.
One of the most consequential revisions involved Nototriche jamesonii, previously categorised as Least Concern. The earlier assessment, the authors explain, was made when herbarium specimens had not been properly identified and exhaustive field sampling was lacking. A recent revision showed that several specimens housed at QCA and QCNE had been misidentified as N. jamesonii, and after curating the collections, the species is now restricted to the central Andes around Chimborazo volcano, with an additional record from Carihuairazo volcano. With an extent of occurrence of 712.15 square kilometres and an area of occupancy of 48.00 square kilometres, two confirmed locations and an estimated fewer than 2,500 mature individuals, the species is proposed as Endangered under criterion B1ab(iii). It has the highest altitude collection record of the genus in Ecuador, reported almost at 5,000 metres near Whymper’s Refuge on Chimborazo, and faces threats from tourism, including trampling along trekking trails, road construction, pollution and abnormal warming.
Nototriche phyllanthos, the first species of the genus described for Ecuador, was moved from Least Concern to Vulnerable under criterion B2b(iii). It has the largest range of the five, with an extent of occurrence of approximately 11,075.53 square kilometres and an area of occupancy of 108.00 square kilometres, across six locations including the páramos around Pichincha, Antisana and Cotopaxi volcanoes, the Quispicacha summit in Tungurahua, parts of Chimborazo and Lagunas de Ozogoche. The species shows high abundance in northern páramos, with individuals growing closely together, but its habitat is in observed decline in quality and area due to anthropogenic pressures and historical land use. Notably, the greatest population, found at Pichincha volcano, is not under any protection scheme, leaving it vulnerable to urban development, agriculture, trampling, pollution and energy infrastructure such as antennas placed in its habitat.
The study’s authors frame their work within a broader crisis for Ecuadorian páramo biodiversity. A 2023 study documented 1,735 páramo plant species throughout the country, of which 690 are endemic to the ecosystem, and approximately 75 percent of those endemics were categorised as threatened in the 2011 national Red List assessment. The páramos remain inadequately sampled, with substantial gaps in specimen curation, species discovery and distributional knowledge. The work, they conclude, illustrates the need for new research on páramo vegetation in the Ecuadorian Andes, where specialised plants adapted to extreme conditions face mounting pressure from agricultural expansion, livestock grazing, infrastructure projects, tourism and a warming climate.
Subject of Research: Conservation assessments of the five endemic Nototriche mallow species in the Ecuadorian páramos
Article Title: Species conservation profile and updated assessment of the genus Nototriche Turcz. ( Malvaceae , Malvoideae ) in the páramos of Ecuador
Article References: Trujillo, E., & Muriel, P. (2026). Species conservation profile and updated assessment of the genus Nototriche Turcz. (Malvaceae, Malvoideae) in the páramos of Ecuador. Biodiversity Data Journal, 14, Article e203556. https://doi.org/10.3897/bdj.14.e203556
Image Credits: AI Generated
Keywords: Nototriche, Ecuador, páramo, superpáramo, IUCN Red List, conservation assessment, Malvaceae, Antisana, Chimborazo, endemic plants, high-Andean flora, biodiversity
News Source: Margaret Porter. (October 29, 2026). Ecuador’s High-Andean Cushion Plants Face Extinction Risk in First Full Red List Assessment. Scienmag.
