Andreettaea cabellensis

Cordillera de La Costa and Cordillera de Mérida, where this species was collected, are the mountain ranges with the longest period of human occupation in Venezuela (Ataroff 2001) and have been identified as two of the country's deforestation hotspots, mainly due to agriculture, livestock farming and urban development (Pacheco et al. 2014). The Cordillera de La Costa includes the most populous urban centres of Venezuela (Portillo-Quintero et al. 2010). There are some protected areas in these Cordilleras that have helped to maintain parts of the habitat where this species was collected (Portillo-Quintero et al. 2010), and, although there are management issues threatening these areas, the main impact is at lower altitudes outside this species range (Parks Watch 2004, Muñoz et al. 2006). This orchid can also be considered sensitive to climate change due to its habitat specialization and because the montane forests where it occurs may be threatened by climate warming and drying under climate change (Rangwala and Miller 2012, Foden et al. 2013, IPCC 2014).

There are records of this species in Henri Pittier National Park and in San Esteban National Park, Venezuela (IUCN and UNEP-WCMC 2016). There are also various records in category V protected areas, for example Río Capaz protective zone and Area Metropolitana de Caracas protective zone, where humans interactions with the landscape through traditional management practices are permitted (IUCN and UNEP-WCMC 2016). Consequently, monitoring is needed to ensure the species is not impacted by human activities. It is listed in CITES (the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora) Appendix II, which gives protection from international trade to all orchid species (UNEP-WCMC 2015). No information on ex situ conservation measures was found. Research is recommended to establish the species distribution in Colombia and overall current population size and trends.