Bryoflora from the tourist state park of Alto do Ribeira, São Paulo state, Brazil Brioflora do Parque Estadual Turístico do Alto do Ribeira (Petar), estado de São Paulo, Brasil

Abstract

The Tourist State Park of Alto do Ribeira (Petar) is situated in one of the best preserved places of the “paulista” Atlantic Forest in the south of São Paulo state, and it is also internationally recognized for its speleological richness. The work aims to increase the list of the bryophyte species for the Atlantic forest of Petar. The literature and the material deposited in the Herbarium Maria Eneyda Pacheco Kauffmann Fidalgo (SP) records add 72% of the 109 species now listed for the park, which represent about 12% of the species known to the state of São Paulo. This increase of species and the occurrence of Chiloscyphus quadridentatus (Spruce) J. J. Engel & R. M. Schust. (cited for the first time for São Paulo and threatened in that state) show the importance of Petar in protecting the bryophytes diversity of the São Paulo state. The bryoflora of Petar is typical of the “paulista” Atlantic Forest, but it also has some species restricted to that ecosystem of the park in São Paulo, and both data confirm the importance of Petar in protecting the bryoflora of the Atlantic Forest in that state. In Petar, where the climate is moist and the more available substrate for bryophytes is rock, bryoflora is characterized by the variety of life forms and by the greater number of generalist and shade, than sun species. The greatest similarity among the bryoflora of Petar and that one of the Atlantic forest “paulistas” localities, which have largest number of bryophyte species reveals that bryoflora surveys are still needed to better characterize the bryophyte flora of that ecosystem in São Paulo.