Conservation Status and re-introduction of Bermuda’s Governor Laffan fern-an endangered endemic

Summary

The Governor Laffan fern (Diplazium laffanianum), Bermuda's most endangered plant and unseen in the wild since 1905, had dwindled to just five living specimens at the Bermuda Botanic Gardens by 2003, with no established propagation protocol and no surviving original habitat, since the limestone cave entrances it once occupied have been destroyed by development. Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo partnered with the Bermuda Botanic Garden to save the species without cloning, instead nursing the remaining plants until two produced small amounts of spores, which were flown to Nebraska for laboratory culturing; the timing proved critical, since Hurricane Fabian struck Bermuda with seawater damage to the last wild adults shortly after the spores were shipped out. After repeated culturing attempts, the spores began germinating successfully, and over six years, four shipments carrying hundreds of young ferns grown in sterile in vitro culture were hand-carried back to Bermuda for rearing at the Tulo Valley Nursery, since no natural habitat remains to receive them and cultivation must continue there for the foreseeable future or until a restored site is identified. Bermudian authorities at the Ministry of the Environment now oversee monitoring and any future decisions about wild reintroduction. Major difficulties included the extremely limited spore viability window, the small and possibly genetically narrow source population, and complex ex vitro acclimatization for this sensitive species. The project rates itself Highly Successful, crediting the collaboration with preventing the fern's outright extinction and developing propagation protocols useful to future plant reintroduction work.