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Saturday, November 27, 2010

Errata, Taxonomy

For reasons which are too complicated and boring to go into, I was up at 3:30 AM yesterday, and used the opportunity to update links to plant profiles and make some minor changes to old posts. You're not at all obligated to care, but these are them:
  • Aloe maculata is now correctly identified. Posts no longer refer to the synonym A. saponaria.
  • Alworthia 'Black Gem' replaces the earlier, incorrect Aloe 'Black Gem.'
  • Hoya carnosa var. holliana replaces Hoya carnosa 'Holliana.' I'm not sure it's right, but I do at least know that the plant is not Hoya holliana, which is how I had it on the spreadsheet for forever.
  • I am now spelling CalibrAchoa correctly. (It's not CalibrIchoa.) I sort of understand why the ex-boss used to insist on calling them "mini-petunias" even though they're not.
  • Dracaena surculosa replaces the obsolete synonym D. godseffiana.
  • My plant that I thought was either Aglaonema 'Silver Bay' or 'Emerald Bay' was identified in the comments to the Aglaonema profile as A. 'Emerald Bay' by a very confident-sounding Anonymous person, so I changed that.
  • Aloe x 'Dorian Black' makes more sense than A. x 'Doran Black,' so the plant I'd been calling Doran is now being called Dorian, except that it might not be that either. I don't have a positive ID for it, I've never had a positive ID for it, and I don't anticipate having a positive ID for it in the future. But if I have to guess, and kinda I do, then I'm going with 'Dorian Black.' (UPDATE: Actually it's 'Doran' after all. This has since been corrected.)
  • Aloe vera is in fact the current correct name for Aloe barbadensis, I think just to spite me; older posts have been changed accordingly.
  • During the research for the Ficus elastica profile, I ran into a number of sources that made it sound more dangerous to children and pets than the other Ficus species. Consequently, I changed the posts in the houseplant toxicity posts to reflect this: Ficus elastica is now in the Potentially Dangerous category, rather than the Unpleasant category. The other Ficuses remain in Unpleasant until I hear something to change my mind.
  • I finally got around to changing Carludovica 'Jungle Drum' to Asplundia 'Jungle Drum.' Even if the plant is usually sold as Carludovica, I think the plant is much more likely an Asplundia.
  • Somehow, I dropped an "i" from Pilea nummularIIfolia. This is probably because nummularifolia makes a lot more sense, even though it's wrong.
  • Ficus maclellandii replaces Ficus binnendijkii, though I very much preferred saying and typing binnendijkii.
  • The dumb-sounding Anthurium andrAEAnum is apparently correct; I'll be really lucky if I can remember not to spell it andrEAnum, like I've been doing for the last three years.

6 comments:

  1. I can't positively ID your particular plant, but I can say without question that the correct name for the aloe cultivar is 'Doran Black', an eponym given in honor of a plant breeder by the same name. Not to worry... It is very commonly misspelled, and cactus and succulent folk -- while they can be picky, they are also a generous and forgiving lot. They are always happy to hear people speaking their language, even if we sometimes speak with an accent.

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  2. Well, crap. I put it on the list, and will change it back whenever I do this again.

    After which point I will probably find out that the ID is wrong.

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  3. If it makes you feel any better, it was rather famously misspelled 'Dorian Black' on labels from venerable pillars of cactus and succulent culture, including Grigsby Cactus Gardens. ('Famously', that is, in a teeny, tiny corner of the larger world.)

    The slip makes perfect sense... Dorian Gray/Dorian Black.

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  4. Dear Mr Subjunctive, I just noticed that the link to Ficus maclellandii (formerly F. binnendijkii) goes nowhere..
    Love your website! Best regards from The Netherlands.

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  5. Maaike:

    Thanks for letting me know. The post is just not there anymore, even though I didn't delete it. I do have a saved copy somewhere, but it's going to be a pain to copy and republish. Plus it's really alarming that the post disappeared in the first place.

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  6. Okay, the Ficus maclellandii post's link should work now. Also fixed the link in the sidebar, which had the same problem.

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