Hohenbergiopsis guatemalensis

Large portions of forests in the lowest elevations of the range of this species have been eliminated and altered by subsistence farming. Only small patches remain. Scrub and secondary communities have sprung up in their place. Logging and cattle grazing cause the greatest habitat loss. Higher elevations remain relatively intact. However, even those natural barriers to human intervention are giving way to the pressures of development as the area's primarily indigenous population outgrows its traditional agricultural base of corn cultivation in the surrounding pine-oak habitat and is forced to expand into areas that are ultimately unsustainable. Very little natural habitat is protected within conservation units and this may suffer from little enforcement and management (Powell and Palminteri 2001, Valero et al. 2001). Hohenbergiopsis guatemalensis was collected in disturbed primary forest. The ability of this shade and moisture loving species to regenerate in secondary vegetation is unknown.

The taxon is an attractive ornamental bromeliad, which is cultivated and available for sale. Many Bromeliads in the region also have ornamental or ceremonial value to the indigenous people. There is a local and rapidly expanding international market for bromeliads, which are collected in large numbers from wild populations without control of the extraction rate (Read 1989, Wolf and Konning 2001). In Mexico, the volume of illicitly traded epiphytes in local markets exceeds legal exports and comprises many species (Toledo-Aceves and Wolf 2008). Most bromeliads have a long life cycle, which increases the incentive to collect wild specimen for direct sale. The impact of potential extraction on the population is unknown.

Tropical montane forests are especially sensitive to atmospheric climate change and likely to be the most affected. Predicted increase in dry seasons, drought and reduction in cloud formation patterns are expected to cause the replacement of many of the narrow altitude range cloud forests by lower altitude ecosystems, as well as the expulsion of peak residing cloud forests into extinction. Species with very high habitat specificity are unlikely to colonize these modified ecosystems, which may favour the invasion of exotic trees and pathogens. Migration will be limited by habitat fragmentation. Increased hurricanes and intense rainstorms may also damage cloud forest.

Only one collection of this species was made within a protected area in Guatemala. It is grown in various botanical institutions (Horres et al. 2007). The taxon was listed as Endangered in Guatemala, on the 1997 IUCN Red List. Surveys should be conducted in the type locality and potentially suitable sites of occurrence to determine the current size and range of the population and whether local extinction has occurred. The population should be closely monitored and its dynamics studied. The impact of extraction for ornamental or ceremonial purposes should be studied. Seeds should be collected for germplasm conservation.