Hmmm, I am pretty familiar with most of the Drosera species, and how to spell them: but when it comes to the others I rely heavily on spelling listed on Bob Ziemer's website at:
http://www.humboldt.edu/~rrz7001/
Bob draws his information (including spelling) from Dr. Schlauer's CP Database and this makes for a fine central reference: sort of like a Webster's of CP. Keeps me looking good (thanks Bob!
If it isn't listed on Bob's page, the name is botanically illegitimate. The International Congress of Botanical Nomenclature monitors and maintains all legitimate scientific names, and only the legitimate names will be found there. Just click a Genus, scroll down alphabetically and there you have it.
So, there are a lot of names, and sometimes they become illegitimate and are renamed: it gets pretty thick. I doubt anyone has a handle on the whole show. I certainly don't. Probably Dr. Schlauer does, LOL. A good handy reference is always a good idea though.
I take a lot of pride in this aspect of the hobby. I like to have my information and spellings correct. It does take some effort, but I feel it is worthwhile to appear intelligent: <snort> I got 'em all snowed. >
Still, I have taken extensive taxonomy courses in my college years (passed them too!
, was raised Roman Catholic in my formative years, and my grandparents came from Italy, so the Latin comes pretty easily. Taxonomy Profs. tend to be pretty fussy about that stuff. For me, the name itself carries a lot of information regarding form and color, location, and significant other data that I might not otherwise have internalized. In the stated case of Nepenthes infundibuluiformis (an invalid species I believe), there is the suffix -formis: i.e. "shaped like..." the prefix: infundibulu/o means "shaped like an infundibulum", or "funnel shaped". So, by the name I can understand the nature of this species without ever having met it, formally speaking.
I want to say a word about common names too. These are the names used by "just folk". Names like "round leaved sundew" or "scented sundew" "bridal veil sundew" were used for many generations by many people. This "homegrown" knowledge was taught and handed down for so many years, and now these names are being forgotten (untaught) in favor of the Latin binomials. It seems a shame and a waste that this should happen, so I encourage everyone to try to keep the old folky names going as well as the new fangeled scienteeefic 'uns. They both have their place I guess.
"What's in a name? A rose by any other name would smell as sweet!"
----William Shakespear
Some of these cp names are really long/oddly worded/and hard are to pronounce (I believe most are Latin names that is why). How many of you can actually type the whole name with out looking at the correct spelling? The second part is would you be able to pronounce them correctly enough to use them in a conversation? "Yes this is my Nepenthes bicalcarata and Cephalotus follicularis which are my best plants. Now if you look over here you will see my Sarracenia leucophylla."
