ON: So this occurrence happens in the boundary with the state of Bahia?

Cláudio: This frontier is badly done.

Cláudio: No. Habenaria fastor is not a new occurrence. There is a mistake in Pabst's book that has not been noticing by many people. We should pay attention to some things that I think it is worth to talk about.
Pabst changed into synonyms many species but when he presented the geographical distribution of the species in all country, he didn't necessarily include all occurrence of those he considered as synonyms. Habenaria fastor had been described by Ruschi as Habenaria nabucoi. Habenaria nabucoi and Habenaria fastor are the same plant and Pabst got into this conclusion. In fact, he didn't use fastor, he used sartor. Fastor is the valid name. However if he got to the conclusion that a plant is synonym of the other, how its synonym is not included in the geographical distribution? This was not mention there but it doesn't mean that the citation is new.

ON: So it would be former reported to Espírito Santo under the name of Habenaria nabucoi?

Cláudio: Yes, it has been reported with another name. It occurred with another species but can't remember all of them now. However there will be many new citations to the state Espírito Santo. Why? Because the sandbank of Espírito Santo has, inside it, this two kind of different forests, it means, when the Tableland forest finishes, starts the hillside Atlantic forest. This sandbank has suffered the influence of all those things.
Don't be amazed if one finds Cattleya forbesi in Presidente Kennedy, next to the frontier with the state of Rio de Janeiro. This an area that, in my thesis, remained unexplored, it is the last sandbank of Espírito Santo. We are not sure about the extension of this occurrence in the sandbank, but it could be there.

ON: Do you consider your inventory about the sandbank exhaustive?

Cláudio: Yes, I do.
Considering the dimension of the area and the time I had, I collected really very well.
However we can't "control" all plants, in all blooming seasons. I didn't form a collection at home with my work with orchids, I dried plants and placed them at the herbarium as it should scientifically be done.
Nowadays, for the doctorate's thesis, if I have money to maintain alive collections, in a scientific institution that would be the Botanical Garden, I will collect sterile plants that I've never done. I could have seen a Cattleya in the south of the state and did not know what the species was, as, in fact, happened. I saw a Cattleya in the south of the state when I collected Cattleya guttata, but it was a small Cattleya. That could be Cattleya harrisoniana or

ON: Cattleya forbesi...

Cláudio: or...

ON: Cattleya intermedia?

Cláudio: We don't know.

ON: Cattleya intermedia has never been found in Espírito Santo, at least until now.

Cláudio: Never, but this work was the first step to those things.
Those boundaries of the states of Espírito Santo and Rio de Janeiro will be effectively worked in my doctorate. We can say that a survey of 48.600 hectares done in two yeas is exhausting.

ON: Of course.

ON: Did you find Bletia catenulata in the sandbanks of Espírito Santo?

Cláudio: I've never found it there. It occurs until Bahia...

ON: It also occurs in state of Rio de Janeiro. There also is in the sandbank of Massambaba.

Cláudio: Someone told me, that it occurs in Rio de Janeiro city.

ON: I've never heard about this occurrence.

Cláudio: I am not sure, I didn't go there to verify. By the description, it would be it. Bletia catenulata is not a very easy plant to see when it is not blooming.

ON: It looses the leaves...

Cláudio: It looses the leaves and has not pseudbulb, it has a true corm and part of it stays underground. That's why is so difficult to be seen when sterile. I looked for Bletia catenulata in the south of Espírito Santo and never saw it. I looked during its blooming season in the districts of Presidente Kennedy, Marataíses, Itapemirim but I've never found it. Those regions have similar swamps.

ON: Those species you found in the sandbanks, they are limited to this kind of habitat or they have a distribution along the state?

Cláudio: Part of species found in the north coastal also occurs in the tableland forests, which are placed behind the north sandbank. The most part of the species of the central-south coastal (where there is the hillside Atlantic forest), is more specific. Between the species which occur in the sandbanks, 27 occur simultaneously in tableland forest, 15 occur simultaneously in the hillside forest, 14 occur in both ecosystems and 17 are exclusive to sandbanks. This is the kind of relation I found in my thesis but a great part of the plants are also found in another kind of ecosystems. This is an information that is lacked in my thesis that may be I counterbalance now, using the patter unities of hillside Atlantic forest and tableland forset. I just check off what occur in the sandbank and had already been collected in Atlantic forest. Now, for my doctorate's thesis, I will do a statistical analyze very different from that I already did. I will collect in Atlantic forest everything that shows up and many things will show up, besides those found in the sandbank.

Cláudio: Very curious but this a plants from the northeast, from the south of Bahia.

ON: There also is in Amazon... But it is curious even though it is not a new occurrence for the region.

Cláudio: It is in Pabst's book.

ON: But some people succeed. Lou Menezes cultivates Coryanthes macrantha.

Cláudio: I don't know if this species occurs in anthill.

ON: Epidendrum coronatum is another curiosity because it was only reported to the states of Amazonas, Pará and Mato Grosso.

Cláudio: Oh! Heavens... I just found it in a place in the sandbank.

ON: Just there? So it is really a restrict habitat.

Cláudio: Well, I just found it in Jacaraípe, but it also occurs in Vale do Rio Doce and Linhares environmental reserves. Jacaraípe is the beginning of the sandbank in the north of Espírito Santo.

Cláudio: Ruschi, in fact, has already collected Galeandra stangeana, as Galeandra dives. It is often mistaken with Galeandra dives, but it is a different plant. It is, effectively, Galeandra stangeana.

ON: It seems that Galeandra dives even occurs in Brazil.

Cláudio: It is a mistake.

ON: What we knew until now with this nomenclature, would be, in fact, Galeandra claesii.
And Trichocentrum cornucopiae? Nowadays, it is considered as synomym of Trichocentrum fuscum.

Cláudio: Trichocentrum cornucopiae may be is a synomym of Trichocentrum fuscum which occurs in Rio de Janeiro.

ON: And about Pelexia maculata which were just reported tro the states of Pará and Amazonas?

Cláudio: This is also a crazing thing, a plant with golden leaves.
It is very beautiful; it is so golden that it is immaculate.
But you are talking about plants from the north of Espírito Santo, they are restrict to this region.

ON: Those Those simultaneous occurrences in Espírito Santo/Bahia with plants from the Amazon region aroused my curiosity. You are saying that this region would be a continuation of the Amazon Hylean. How?

Cláudio: Many people told it. Martius talked about. The name of Baiana Hylean passing by the Amazon Hylean. The question is interesting because with orchids, we have the sensation that the migratory event is possible. The seed is light so it is easy to fly. When you are analyzing and you see that the orchids is behaving in a way similar to the trees, you say to yourself:" - Wait a minute. If it comes for migration, why a Lecyitidaceae doesn't do.
This one can't fly but presents the same kind of thing the orchids present in the south of Bahia and north of Espírito Santo.
There are plants disjoint with the Amazon region. What would be the best explanation for this if not the migration? The "cerrado" (woodland savannah) started to extend in a certain moment of the history of the earth, after it, the caatinga stretch out behind it; this is the area that separated the two big blocs of the forest. May be it was one of the last point to dissociate and kept a bridge of species that stay alive until today and can be in both places. We have no answer for this. This is speculation. There two words that I used in the thesis, if it is migration, it is vicarism. They are plants that are in different places and show that, one day, those place were together. This is the explanation I prefer and have adopted in my thesis. I discarded migration. Ruschi opted por migration. I know that, in Amazon, Pedro Ivo Soares Braga studied migration, Fábio de Barros discussed about migration. In fact, in the region I studied, I prefer to believe in vicarism, as already said by Briegeri in the past.

ON: You mean, the Amazon forest has already come until the north of Espírito Santo and south of Bahia?

Cláudio: Yes. One day, they were together but an arid zone grown separating the two big forests. There are are the peculiarities of soil: clayish sedimentary and very sandy soil, placed in lowlands, flat, similar to Amazon. The bigger diversification occurred in the hillside.

ON: But it wouldn't be equal forest.

Cláudio: Equal no but they were connected, they...

ON: But they would be different. They would be very different.

Cláudio: But the kept for more time the same characteristics while the hillside Atlantic forest made possible a great appearance of habitats that justifies the appearance of new species. This is one of the explanations.
Do you want a definitive answer? It doesn't exist.

ON: However it remains very interesting and curious because we see a plant there, in Amazon region and here, in the south of Bahia and nort of Espírito Santo, northeast and southeast regions. This is very crazy.

Cláudio: Very crazy, that is why I want to go until the south of Bahia, until Salvador in order to, in the future, do an analyze of the sandbanks from the Pará until Rio Grande do Sul. It seems that Salvador forms a barrier of plants.
To go ahead with my studies, besides the doctorate, perhaps, I should start studying the hydrographical basins. So, the sandbanks are not limited to official frontiers, we know that, but regarding to the forests (I am doing a simple division, tableland forest, Atlantic forest) and those hydrographical basins of this Atlantic forest, do they have an influence on the floristics of the sandbanks? They could have.

ON: How many years you think you will live? With all those projects... You should live 200 years, at least.

Cláudio: The master degree took six years and the doctorate will take four.

ON: Yes but you have also this project of hydrographical basins...

Cláudio: No, this one I wouldn't do but it is an opportunity that my work could generate.
In fact, when you do an analyze, you can do it just under a point of view but you will give general information that in order to, in the future, do the hydrographical basins of that forest.
I will not hiding information. I will say that this plant is here, over there but is not there. This will be pointed out and anyone who wanted to study with hydrographical basin and noticed that my information are worth to analyzed, he will take my information and will not want to go to wood. I will use information from other researchers in my doctorate. Or do you thing that I succeed in collecting Rio de Janeiro and southg of Bahia? Dorothy Sue Dunn Araujo did half work to me, here in Rio de Janeiro, collecting in the sandbanks. The orchids were collect and without identification and I did it. If I need to analyze the plants from Rio de Janeiro, I have already the contribution of this great botanist.

ON: Recently we talked about the occurrence of the orchids in the sandbanks of Rio de Janeiro, mainly in Massambaba, we used the information gathered by Maria da Penha Fagnani and the research done by Dorothy Sue Dunn Araujo. What did you find in common between the sandbanks of Espírito Santo and Rio de Janeiro? Are they more or less uniform, are they similar?