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Semi-meaningless Beauty

Joseph Clemens

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Curious how my aesthetics for Pinguicula have changed over the years. I was just using BobZ's CP Photofinder to view lots of very beautiful photos of other people's Pinguicula plants. It was quite inspiring.

But by doing so I was reminded of my frustration with the unfamiliarity that exists among many otherwise excellent growers, unfamiliarity with plant nomenclature, that is. Many of these beautiful plants, especially hybrids, were sometimes listed with aberrant hybrid formula (lists of three or more possible parents, simply separated by x's - no way to know how they are actually related), and/or parent names that are just not recognizable, so I can't tell which species or hybrids the parents actually are, or how the crossings were accomplished.

Okay, some of these plants are so attractive, I can still enjoy their beauty. But the grower in me, wants to know how they were created, so I might attempt the same hybrid, myself. And, I might want to grow some of these same clones, myself -- but how can I find them if I can't use correct nomenclature to identify them, when I search for them?
 
suite

if the parents' names are simply separated by an x , theoretically by the code of nomenclature mother is always the first and second father.

now often the main character traits of the hybrid are those of the mother

For example:
a P. 'Sethos' : P. ehlersiae x moranensis; P. ehlersiae is the mother and the father P. moranensis
a P. 'Weser' : P. moranensis x ehlersiae; P. moranensis is the mother and the father P. ehlersiae

is clearly visible with the traits of characters

jeff
 
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But, how do you know for certain which parents are which and in which combinations when you see > P. esseriana x gracilis x moranensis, or P. laueana x gypsicola x esseriana x gracilis. No brackets, no parentheses, no ordered pairs, whatsoever. Just a list of three or more species, cultivars, or locally named plants, each separated by nothing more than x's. If species names are used, you're lucky if they're spelled well enough to recognize them. Of course, if it were just two parents, as long as the names were spelled well enough to be recognized, it would normally be seed parent, first. Modern ICBN allows any order as long as
Male.jpg
and
Female.jpg
symbols are used to indicate which parent are which, but parentheses, brackets, and braces are necessary to indicate which are which.

In the first example it could be, P. esseriana x (gracilis x moranensis), or P. (esseriana x gracilis) x moranensis. And in the second example it could be, P. (laueana x gypsicola) x (esseriana x gracilis), or P. [laueana x (gypsicola x esseriana)] x gracilis, or several other possibilities.

Try guessing what kind of hybrid this is: P. "small blue flower" x "long pink leaves".

What I know for certain, with several I recently viewed, is that they are very attractive plants of indeterminate parentage.
 
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Knowing nothing about proper nomenclature in biology, I must say that I have been guilty of some of the improprieties you're describing. But even having been in this hobby for less than a year, I'm beginning to see the importance of all this. What gives this the most gravity to me is that so many CPs at this point are more common in cultivation than they are in the wild, and some don't exist in the wild at all.

I'm going to go ahead and update my grow list to include hybrid formulas on all of my hybrid species. Just cuz.
 
The problem that I have with a couple plants is that everyone seems to spell them differently which shouldn't be the case... I've seen N. x Trusmardiensis and N. x Trusmadiensis. It's even worse with some of the plants that end in "i" because sometimes people include only one or two "i's at the end, which makes it hard to get it right... like is it N. kerrii with two "i"s?
 
This is as bad as people with hyphenated names marrying others with hyphenated names. After 8 generations, you have 256 last names!
 
I understand your frustration and I do believe it is important to have all your plants properly labeled so you can know their ancestry. But, with that being said, what's most important is the plant itself. If the plant has desirable characteristics, that's what matters. It's just important that people call things as such. If you have an unknown Pinguicula than call it P. "mutt".

The term mutt exists for a reason and in my opinion, especially regarding Pinguicula, after so many plants have crossed with one another, mutt status is achieved pretty quickly.

But like I said, I do agree with you that we should all do our best to know what our plants are.
 
Does anyone have any Nepenthes (edwardsiana x bicalcarata) x (edwardsiana x hamata)? Willing to trade for a Drosera capensis?!

Love your signature!
 
The problem that I have with a couple plants is that everyone seems to spell them differently which shouldn't be the case... I've seen N. x Trusmardiensis and N. x Trusmadiensis. It's even worse with some of the plants that end in "i" because sometimes people include only one or two "i's at the end, which makes it hard to get it right... like is it N. kerrii with two "i"s?
The most authoritative reference for correct spelling would be the source description. For example, for N. kerrii see
http://www.carnivorousplants.it/desc.kerrii.pdf
Another great reference is the CP Database
http://www.omnisterra.com/bot/cp_home.cgi
 
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And, if you aren't familiar with plant descriptions that are in latin, or possibly some other language besides your native language, there is always google translate, or several other online translation utilities that can assist you.
 
  • #11
Love your signature!

Thanks :D.

So you want to trade, right? I have two, no make that three fatty capensis with your name on them.
 
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  • #12
LOL! would the nomenclature be applicable to humans? Could we then refer to our author as Clemens Joseph?
 
  • #13
This is exactly why I've been preaching that the carnivorous plant naming conventions, especially for genera which readily hybridize, need to change over to a grex and cultivar system like that used for orchids. Such a naming convention completely eliminates the ambiguity in complex hybrids because it allows growers who aren't good with detailed botanical nomenclature to accurately track hybrids and cultivars/clones without introducing transcription errors in sales and trades, or when making new ID tags.

How can we petition to have this system adopted? It's desperately needed for Sarracenia, Pinguicula, and Nepenthes.
 
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