User:E3B-DM/sandbox

Editing article for "Venus Flytrap":

Add to lead section:

The population of the Venus flytrap has been declining in its native range, primarily due to habitat loss and fire suppression. The species is currently under Endangered Species Act review by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. It is classified as “Vulnerable” by the IUCN Red List.

Add as new paragraphs after existing habitat section:

They are full sun plants, usually found only in areas with less than 10% canopy cover. The microhabitat where it thrives is typically sparse with grasses, herbs, sphagnum, and often bare patches where there aren’t enough nutrients for noncarnivorous plants to survive, or where fires regularly clear competition and prevent cover from forming. Thus, natural fires are an important part of its habitat, required every 3-5 years in most places for D. muscipula to thrive. After fire, D. muscipula seeds germinate well in ash and sandy soil, with seedlings growing well in the open post-fire conditions. The seeds germinate immediately without a dormant period.

Replace existing conservation section with:

Conservation Although widely cultivated for sale as a houseplant, D. muscipula has suffered a significant decline in its population in the wild. The population in its native range is estimated to have decreased 93% since 1979.

 Status 

The species is under Endangered Species Act review by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. The current review commenced in 2018, after an initial "90 day" review found that action may be warranted. A previous review in 1993 resulted in a determination that the plant was a “Potential candidate without sufficient data on vulnerability". The IUCN Red Lis t classifies the species as "vulnerable".  The State of North Carolina lists Dionaea muscipula as a species of "Special Concern- Vulnerable".  In 2010, CITES listed it as an Appendix II species.   NatureServe classified it as "Imperiled" (G2) in a 2018 review.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has not indicated a timeline to conclude its current review of Dionaea muscipula. The Endangered Species Act specifies a two-year timeline for a species review. However, researchers have shown that the species listing process takes 12.1 years on average.

Range Dionaea muscipula occurs naturally only along the coastal plain of North and South Carolina in the U.S, with all known current sites within 90 km of Wilmington, North Carolina. A 1958 survey of herbaria specimens and old documents found 259 sites where the historical record documented the presence of D. muscipula, within 21 counties in North and South Carolina. As of 2019, it was considered extirpated in North Carolina in the inland counties of Moore, Robeson, and Lenoir, as well as the South Carolina coastal counties of Charleston and Georgetown. Remaining extant populations exist in North Carolina in Beaufort, Craven, Pamlico, Carteret, Jones, Onslow, Duplin, Pender, New Hanover, Brunswick, Columbus, Bladen, Sampson, Cumberland, and Hoke counties, and in South Carolina in Horry county.

Population

A large-scale survey in 2019, conducted by the North Carolina Natural Heritage Program, counted a total of 163,951 individual Venus flytraps in North Carolina and 4,876 in South Carolina, estimating a total of 302,000 individuals remaining in the wild in its native range. This represents a reduction of more than 93% from a 1979 estimate of approximately 4,500,000 individuals. A 1958 study found 259 confirmed extant or historic sites. As of 2016, there were 71 known sites where the plant could be found in the wild. Of these 71 sites, only 20 were classified as having excellent or good long-term viability.

Threats

The Venus flytrap is only found in the wild in a very particular set of conditions, requiring flat land with moist, acidic, nutrient-poor soils that receive full sun and burn frequently in forest fires, and is therefore sensitive to many types of disturbance. A 2011 review identified five categories of threats for the species: agriculture, road-building, biological resource use (poaching and lumber activities), natural systems modifications (drainage and fire suppression), and pollution (fertilizer).

Habitat loss is a major threat to the species. The human population of the coastal Carolinas is rapidly expanding. For example, Brunswick County, North Carolina, which has the largest number of Venus flytrap populations, has seen a 27% increase in its human population from 2010 to 2018. As the population grows, residential and commercial development and road building directly eliminate flytrap habitat, while site preparation that entails ditching and draining can dry out soil in surrounding areas, destroying the viability of the species. Additionally, increased recreational use of natural areas in populated areas directly destroys the plants by crushing or uprooting them.

Fire suppression is another threat to the Venus flytrap. In the absence of regular fires, shrubs and trees encroach, outcompeting the species and leading to local extirpations. D. muscipola requires fire every 3-5 years, and best thrives with annual brush fires. Although flytraps and their seeds are typically killed alongside their competition in fires, seeds from flytraps adjacent to the burnt zone propagate quickly in the ash and full sun conditions that occur post a fire disturbance. Because the mature plants and new seedlings are typically destroyed in the regular fires that are necessary to maintain their habitat, D. muscipula’s survival relies upon adequate seed production and dispersal from outside the burnt patches back into the burnt habitat, requiring a critical mass of populations, and exposing the success of any one population to metapopulation dynamics. These dynamics make small, isolated populations particularly vulnerable to extirpation, for if there are no mature plants adjacent to the fire zone, there is no source of seeds post-fire.

Poaching has been another cause of population decline. Harvesting Venus flytraps on public land became illegal in North Carolina in 1958, and since then a legal cultivation industry has formed, growing tens of thousands of flytraps in commercial greenhouses for sale as household plants. Yet in 2016, the NY Times reported that demand for wild plants still exists, which "has led to a 'Venus flytrap crime ring.'"  In 2014, the state of North Carolina made Venus flytrap poaching a felony. Since then, several poachers have been charged, with one man receiving 17 months in prison for poaching 970 Venus flytraps, and another man charged with 73 felony counts in 2019. Poachers may do greater harm to the wild populations than a simple count of individuals taken would indicate, as they may selectively harvest the largest plants at a site, which have more flowers and fruit and therefore generate more seeds than smaller plants.

Additionally, the species is particularly vulnerable to catastrophic climate events. Most Venus flytrap sites are only 2-4 meters (6.5 -13 feet) above sea level and are located in a region prone to hurricanes, making storm surges and rising sea levels a long-term threat.