Neoregelia seideliana

Since the 16th century the Atlantic rainforest, a biodiversity hotspot (Myers et al. 2000), has suffered from uninterrupted deforestation. In addition to the relentless habitat loss to pasture, agriculture, sylviculture and urban sprawl other threats contributing to forest degradation include the harvesting of firewood, illegal logging, plant collecting, tourism and invasion by alien species. It is not known whether the taxon is harvested in the wild for its ornamental value. Filho and Tabarelli (2006), found that some ornamental bromeliads had been intensively collected and almost eliminated from forest fragments close to human settlements.

This species was collected within the biological station of Santa Lucia (Epririto Santo) and within the ecological reserve of Macae do Cima (Rio de Janeiro). Both these protected areas are part of two of the biodiversity corridors which are being implemented in the Brazilian rainforest (the Central Corridor and the Serra do Mar Corridor) as part of the PP-G7 Atlantic forest subprogram (Tabarelli et al. 2005). Biodiversity corridors are landscape-level ecological corridors which consists of network of protected areas and other biodiversity friendly land uses, connecting isolated fragments of habitats (Saatchi et al. 2001). The Atlantic Rainforest has been given high priority for biodiversity conservation because it harbours an extraordinary number of endemic plants and due to the high degree of threats to its megadiversity. Field surveys should be conducted in the historical sites of collection and areas of potential occurrence to estimate the range and the real size of the population and determine whether local extinction has occurred. Samples of seed should be collected and stored as an ex situ conservation measure. The species is cultivated ex situ in botanic gardens such as in the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew.