''Cyanea lobata'' is a rare species of flowering plant in the bellflower family known by the common name Waihee Valley cyanea. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found els ...

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only ...

, where it is known from

Lanai Lanai ( haw, Lānai, , , also ,) is the sixth-largest of the Hawaiian Islands and the smallest publicly accessible inhabited island in the chain. It is colloquially known as the Pineapple Island because of its past as an island-wide pineapple pl ...

and Maui.''Cyanea lobata''.
The Nature Conservancy. It is a federally listed endangered species. Like other '' Cyanea'' it is known as ''haha'' in Hawaiian.USFWS Species Reports: Listed Plants
/ref> This

Hawaiian lobelioid The Hawaiian lobelioids are a group of flowering plants in the bellflower family, Campanulaceae, subfamily Lobelioideae, all of which are endemic to the Hawaiian Islands. This is the largest plant radiation in the Hawaiian Islands, and indeed t ...

is a shrub which may exceed 2 meters in height. The stem may have branches. The

inflorescence An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Morphologically, it is the modified part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed ...

bears greenish or purplish flowers. There are two subspecies of this plant, both very rare. One individual of ssp. ''lobata'' was found in Maui in 1982 after several decades of no observations. This plant was later killed in a

landslide Landslides, also known as landslips, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, deep-seated slope failures, mudflows, and debris flows. Landslides occur in a variety of environments, ...

. In 1996 three more individuals were found. The ssp. ''baldwinii'' had not been seen since 1934 when two plants were discovered on

in 2006. These are being carefully watched.Evenhuis, N. L. and L. G. Eldridge, Eds. (2007)
Records for the Hawaii Biological Society for 2006. Part 2.
''Bishop Museum Occasional Papers'' The five plants remaining of this species are threatened by the destruction and degradation of their wet and moist forest habitat. The Lanai subspecies is found in an

understory In forestry and ecology, understory (American English), or understorey (Commonwealth English The use of the English language in current and former member countries of the Commonwealth of Nations was largely inherited from British co ...

where the ground is 80% covered by

fern A fern (Polypodiopsida or Polypodiophyta ) is a member of a group of vascular plants (plants with xylem and phloem) that reproduce via spores and have neither seeds nor flowers. The polypodiophytes include all living pteridophytes except ...

References

External links

USDA Plants Profile

lobata Lobata is an order of Ctenophora in the class Tentaculata with smaller tentacles than other ctenophores, and distinctive flattened lobes extending outwards from their bodies. They grow up to about long. Anatomy The lobates have a pair of lo ...

Endemic flora of Hawaii Biota of Lanai Biota of Maui Taxa named by Horace Mann Jr. {{Hawaii-stub