A huge water lily that reached a circumference of three meters has been classified as a new species at Kew Gardens in west London. The third species of the Victoria genus, named after Britain's Queen Victoria in 1852, is the most giant lily in the world, Victoria boliviana, and it is native to Bolivia.
Its specimens have been kept for more than 170 years at Kew's Herbarium and 34 years in Bolivia's National Herbarium. It was widely thought to be Victoria amazonica at the time.
A new publication detailing the discovery was released Monday in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science (per New Scientist). It is the conclusion of a multi-year inquiry conducted by a group of specialists from the UK and South America.
World's Most Giant Waterlily Found in UK's Royal Botanic Gardens
Researchers found the world's biggest waterlily named Victoria boliviana. Its leaves may reach a height of three meters in the wild. The eye-catching lily contains spiky petioles, the stalk connects the leaf to the stem, and it has blossoms that change color from white to pink.
The species is naturally found in the water environments of the Llanos de Moxos, and the La Rinconada Gardens in Bolivia now holds the record for the species' biggest plant, with leaves that measure 3.2 meters.
According to Science, this big aquatic plant has specimens that have been stored in the Kew Herbarium for 177 years and the Bolivian National Herbarium for 34 years. However, it was previously believed to be one of the other two species.
It was given the name Victoria boliviana by scientists in honor of its native South America. Since there are so few examples of the original plants that were used to categorize and describe species in the Victorian era, there is a knowledge gap on huge waterlilies. It could be a result of the difficulty of gathering huge waterlilies in the wild.
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Victoria boliviana Explained
The giant waterlily has two known species. However, scientists at the southwest London garden have long speculated there may be a third, Malay Mail reported. They collaborated with Bolivian experts to test their hypothesis.
The Santa Cruz de la Sierra Botanic Garden and La Rinconada Gardens in Bolivia provided a collection of enormous waterlily seeds from the alleged third species in 2016. These were sown and raised at Kew to coexist with the other two species. The three plants' DNA was also examined by scientists, who discovered that they differed significantly from one another.
The three species of the genus - named after Queen Victoria - are Victoria amazonica, cruziana, and boliviana. The findings reported in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science indicate that Victoria cruziana is the new species' closest relative and that their divergence occurred roughly a million years ago.
A scientist at Kew who collaborated on the experiment, Natalia Przelomska, mentioned in a PA News report (via Yahoo! News UK) that describing new species is a significant task amid the fast rate of biodiversity loss.
"We hope that our multidisciplinary framework might inspire other researchers who are seeking approaches to rapidly and robustly identify new species," Przelomska added.
Giant Waterlilies: Victorian Age's Wonder
Reports mention that the huge plants discovered by explorers in the Amazon basin were housed in the waterlily house at Kew Gardens, which opened in 1852. The enormous round leaves of the gigantic waterlily Victoria amazonica, which could sustain a kid's weight, attracted large crowds of onlookers.
After Kew Gardens unsuccessfully attempted for 10 years to grow the seeds, botanists competed to be the first to give Queen Victoria a huge waterlily blossom. Six germinated successfully; some were kept, while the remainder were transported to Chatsworth House in Derbyshire and Syon House in London.
The herb, which astounded the western world, was well-known to the Amazonian Indigenous people, who utilized it for food and healing.
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