[Taxacom] Plant names

Wed Feb 10 11:11:06 CST 2021

I agree with Alan F. -- while there remain some outstanding issues in generic treatment in Polygonaceae, I think it's safe to say that no-one going forward will be placing the species of Reynoutria back in Polygonum.  

USDA Plants has had a longstanding issue with a poorly-designed database system/website that has prevented them from making the changes that are needed to taxonomy and associated information.  I was discussing this just last week with the head of their team, Gerry Moore, and a new system is approaching completion, after which, the "standard USDA Plants taxonomy" will become "unfrozen" and will start modernizing.

More generally, there is no perfect answer about "standardized taxonomy" in vascular plants.  Birds, mammals, even spiders (mentioned by Jozef) have processes for coming to a consensus "list of taxa" that is a very useful thing for many purposes, including conservation.  In vascular plants and at a global level, there is POWO (which has its own issues), COL (likewise), and there was recently an announcement about a new effort to create a curated consensus list -- the Leipzig Catalogue (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41597-020-00702-z ).

For the US and North America, there is Flora North America (nearing completion, though some volumes now 30 years old and getting out-of-date), USDA Plants, and BONAP (Biota of North America Program).  Then, of course there are regional and local efforts.  None of these are perfect in meeting all needs.  The larger the scale, the longer the time lag and the greater the likelihood of more regional and local knowledge being imperfectly compiled.

Partly, it is a matter of scale.  The number of plant species is much larger than those groups with "curated checklists", and for most (maybe not spiders 😉 ) the ratio of number of species to the number of experts is also very high.  So it's a big job and with low resources.

Spiders -- ca. 48,000 species
Birds -- ca. 15,000-25,000 species
Mammals -- ca. 6,400 species
Vascular Plants -- ca. 300,000-400,000 species

Even more generally, the whole idea of a "standardized catalogue of life" has tremendous value for lots of purposes, but is also problematic to maintain in a way compatible with scientific process and philosophy.  There will never be perfect answers to this...

Alan Weakley
Director of the UNC-CH Herbarium (NCU), North Carolina Botanical Garden
Adjunct Associate Professor, Biology Department & Environment, Ecology, and Energy Program
Campus Box 3280, Coker Hall 419, 120 South Road
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Chapel Hill NC 27599-3280
919.619.1101 (mobile)

-----Original Message-----
From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu> On Behalf Of Alan Franck via Taxacom
Sent: Wednesday, February 10, 2021 2:32 AM
To: Taxa com <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] Plant names

Hi Joey,

As I understand it, Reynoutria is the generally accepted genus from recent literature. From a global perspective, Plants of the World Online is quite helpful and often up-to-date. For identification characters, FNA is a good resource, but the Polygonaceae treatment was published in 2005 when Fallopia was thought an appropriate genus for knotweed: http://beta.floranorthamerica.org/Fallopia

I would advise against using Polygonum cuspidatum, as listed by the USDA, since that reflects an old concept of Polygonum s.lat. I am not aware of any recent debate concerning the use of Reynoutria.

Kind regards,

Alan
-- 

Alan R. Franck, Ph.D.
Curator, Wertheim Conservatory
Institute of Environment
Dept. Biological Sciences, OE 167
Florida International University
11200 SW 8th St., Miami, FL 33199

On 2/9/21, 11:04 PM, "Taxacom on behalf of Joey Slowik via Taxacom" <taxacom-bounces at mailman.nhm.ku.edu on behalf of taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu> wrote:

    Note: This message originated from outside the FIU Faculty/Staff email system.

    So this may be a simple question. I'm helping with a Knotweed EA and
    have realized that the recent publications all use a different name
    than the USDA. The USDA plants database, which is what we are told to
    use for reference, seems outdated, like 10+ years. And for some names
    there seems to be no justification but historical use. Is there a
    reason for this? I usually work with spiders and there is a general
    consensus on accepted names from the World Spider Catalog. But is
    there debate in the plant naming world? Is it ok to use old names?

    Thanks

    Jozef Slowik
    UAF Cooperative Extension Service
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