Abstract:

Following the new national checklist of key protected wild plants， we made a taxonomic inventory of key nationally protected wild plants in the Qinghai Province. Data was drawn from consulting relevant literature and inspection of herbarium specimens. Our aim was to better understand their plant types， family and genus distribution， endemism， conservation status， and geographical distribution. It was found that： 1） Compared with species checklists in 1999， 44 key nationally protected wild species are newly added into the species list for Qinghai Province. 2） In Qinghai Province there are 53 species and one variety， 30 genera， 22 families and three categories of key nationally protected wild plants listed. Among them， Nostoc flagelliforme is a level-one key protected wild plant， and 52 species and one variety are level-two key protected wild plants. 3） The family with the largest number of plants listed is the Orchidaceae with 10 species， and the most commonly listed genus is Cypripedium containing eight species. 4） There is one genus endemic to China， there are three genera endemic to China and the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau （QTP）， nine species endemic to China， nine species endemic to the QTP， 13 species endemic to China and the QTP and one species， Meconopsis barbiseta， endemic to Qinghai Province. 5） With respect to conservation status， there are 18 species listed as vulnerable （VU） level， and 12 species listed as endangered （EN） among the 54 key nationally protected wild species from Qinghai Province， which accounted for 55.55% of the total species. 6） Most of the key nationally protected wild species are distributed mainly in the alpine grassland and forest vegetation of Yushu and Golog Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture and Haidong city， which is consistent with the plant diversity distribution pattern in Qinghai Province. There are 53 species and one variety of key nationally protected wild plants in Qinghai Province， most of which are level-two key protected wild plants. Among these， 32 species are endemic species， accounting for 59.25% of the total， and 30 species are among the threatened species. Most of the key nationally protected wild plants are distributed in the southeast of Qinghai Province.

Key words: Qinghai Province, national key protected wild plant, diversity