Use of the rank of forma

[Susan B. Farmer]

>At 03:44 PM 10/1/00, Jacques Melot wrote:
>>    De plus, la suppression du rang de forme serait peu compatible -
>>dans l'esprit et a la lettre - avec l'art. 4.3:
>>
>>4.3. Further ranks may also be intercalated or added, provided that
>>confusion or error is not thereby introduced.
>
>And of course once used, ranks never go away. I have seen names of the form
>Planta excelsa subsp. septentrionalis var. virgata f. alba - any plan to
>deal with orphaned names if a rank were to be "eliminated" would be more
>trouble than it was worth.
>

IPNI is eliminating everything between the specific epithet and the
forma.  If the above were a validly published name, they would list
it in their database as Planta excelsa forma alba -- regardless of how
it was published.

        www.ipni.org

Susan
-----
Susan Farmer
sfarmer at goldsword.com
Botany Department, University of Tennessee
http://www.goldsword.com/sfarmer/Trillium