Flag for Taxon: little brown jug (Hexastylis arifolia)
| Flagger | Content Author | Content | Reason | Flag Created | Resolved by | Resolution |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| bouteloua | little brown jug (Hexastylis arifolia) |
treated as Asarum arifolium in POWO, please discuss before swapping |
Sep. 1, 2018 19:56:00 +0000 | kai_schablewski |
resolved, see my comment |
Comments
Here's a deviation for now https://www.inaturalist.org/taxon_framework_relationships/270789
@loarie @rynxs Unfortunately, I have several issues with the taxonomic framework, as it is presented, especially considering that several distinct species are lost in translation (such as H. sorriei, and H. naniflora). These species do not currently have validly published names in Asarum, so would in effect be identifiable only to genus. Also, some recently described species have not been given a name in Asarum, yet (such as Hexastylis finzelii and Hexastylis rollinsiae), so they would be excluded from the framework and would also not have a name in Asarum. On the other hand, some species in North America that have been described in Asarum, such as Asarum rosei and A. chueyi, are clearly referable to what has been called Hexastylis (based on morphological and genetic studies), but do not have a validly published name in Hexastylis. This leaves us in the unfortunate position of being unable to include every currently accepted species of the North American Hexastylis/Asarum group in any single genus, whether it's Asarum or Hexastylis. Perhaps it would be best to wait until the systematists have finished bickering about this before we make any large-scale changes...
Ah, I thought by your original comment you were okay with the swap, but that was before the species were described. It's perfectly fine to wait if the species have yet to receive an Asarum name.
@rynxs I’m fine with swapping everything over to Asarum, eventually, but if we do it as it was suggested, then we would lose a lot of the diversity from Hexastylis. Either way we go, though, by leaving it as is or by changing it over, we run into problems. Either we’ll lose several generally accepted species and subspecies, or we’ll continue to have clearly congeneric species in different genera. Personally, I prefer the latter option, to leave it in it’s current state and wait until the dust settles before proceeding with any taxon changes.
It seems likely everything will be moved to Asarum, and subgenera will be used to differentiate the old Hexastylis species once some genetic testing is done.
I think that’s quite likely.
I have sorted the large and diverse genus Asarum into subgenera and sections in order to make the genus easier to understand for everyone, the question of what to do with Hexastylis was inevitable.
I have implemented our authority's currently accepted taxonomy. POWO follows the revised classification based on the phylogenetic relationships in Asarum by Sinn et al..
There are still some open questions:
1) Hexastylis naniflora has been synonymized together with Hexastylis minor as Asarum minus.
-> I have not yet synonymized Hexastylis naniflora because I am not sure if it should be accepted as Hexastylis naniflora.
2) Hexastylis rhombiformis has been synonymized together with Hexastylis contracta as Asarum contractum.
-> I have not yet synonymized Hexastylis rhombiformis because I am not sure if it should be accepted as Hexastylis rhombiformis.
3) Asarum speciosum and Hexastylis speciosa are both not accepted on POWO.
4) Hexastylis sorriei Gaddy, Phytoneuron 2011–47: 2. (2011) has no valid equivalent combination in Asarum according to IPNI in spite of the combination Asarum sorriei being published in Sinn (2015). So there was a new combination to Asarum sorriei, why hasn't it been implemented yet on IPNI and POWO?
5) Hexastylis finzelii and Hexastylis rollinsiae have both been described by Brian R. Keener who apparently does not accept the revised classification based on the phylogenetic research by Sinn et al., there is currently no accepted name for them on POWO.
-> I have decided to keep both taxa active, and have moved them to section Hexastylis. These taxa will stay in the genus Hexastylis because there is currently no other name for them.
I will contact POWO and try to resolve most of these issues.
see also:
I would like to close this flag associated with Hexastylis arifolia and if necessary continue to discuss this topic in my new flag "Infrageneric classification of Asarum incl. Hexastylis": https://www.inaturalist.org/flags/608722
@wildlandblogger
The morphological differences separating these two putative genera don't appear too strong to me, and I would be fine with following POWO. If anyone has strong reasons, however, for wanting to maintain them as separate genera, I would be willing to listen to their case.