Re: [Aroid-l] New aroid in western Australia? Typhonium on the

From: Deni Bown <denibown at googlemail.com> on 2011.01.24 at 19:39:22(21802) Thank you Wilbert for a lucid & most interesting low-down on the systematics of Typhonium, with the added bonus as always of your humour. I remember trying to sort this out in my account of Typhonium, Sauromatum, Lazarum & Theriphonum when I revised "Aroids - Plants of the Arum Family" way back in the late 1990s (it was published in 2000). With more luck more than foresight, I subtitled the section on Lazarum versus Typhonium as "The Rise and Fall of Lazarum". If there were another revision (remote possibility with all this e-communication), I would have to re-name the section "The Rise and Fall and Rise Again of Lazarum" or, in a hypothetical post-taxonomic world, rename the genus Phoenix....... Still lurking, now in the bush in Nigeria where there are remarkably few aroids. Where did I go wrong? Deni Bown HTML +More On 21 January 2011 16:56, Wilbert Hetterscheid wrote: Peoples, more particularly Typhoniophiles, There is a lot going on in the systematics (taxonomy) of Typhonium. It is time I gave you a rundown of what has happened the last year when two significant but very contrary papers have appeared on Typhonium. As a very short first warning: Typhonium s.l. (sensu lato = in the wider sense) has been split up in 3 genera, Typhonium s.str. (sesu stricto = in the strict sense), Sauromatum (there it is again, resurrected) and "The Aussies". Matthew Barrett (mentioned on the website with the discussed Typhonium picture from Kimberley) is presently revising the Australian group, which turned out to be independent in evolutionary terms of Typhonium s.s.tr. and Sauromatum. Therefore this Aussie group will get a new name and the first name available for it is probably Lazarum, a genus published for L. mirabile by Alistair Hay, several years ago. What brought this about? You may remember that Peter Boyce and myself (Aroideana 23, 2000) considered on morphological grounds only, that Sauromatum and Typhonium were too much alike to be kept separate. Not to say that there were no differences at all but they seemed insignificant at the time (you see that I am trying to keep guilt at a minimum here....... :-). The molecular revolution in plant systematics has finally also reached Typhonium and in 2010 two papers on this subject were published within a few weeks of each other. First came: Cusimano, N., M.D. Barrett, W.L.A. Hetterscheid & S.S. Renner: A phylogeny of the Areae (Araceae) implies that Typhonium, Sauromatum, and the Australian species of Typhonium are distinct clades. TAXON 59 (2) . April 2010: 439-447. A few weeks later: Ohi-Toma, T., S. Wu, S.R. Yadav, H. Murata & J. Murata: Molecular Phylogeny of Typhonium sensu lato and Its Allied Genera in the Tribe Areae of the Subfamily Aroideae (Araceae) Based on Sequences of Six Chloroplast Regions. Systematic Botany (2010), 35(2): pp. 244-251. The basic conclusions of Cusimano et al. are that Sauromatum is not part of Typhonium and has to contain 9 species we now know mostly as Typhonium or Sauromatum (S. brevipes, S. brevipilosum, S. diversifolium, S. gaoligongense, S. giganteum, S. hirsutum, S. horsfieldii, S. tentaculatum, S. venosum). Another coclusion is that the endemic species of Australia are not closely enough related to Sauromatum or the remaining Typhoniums, to be part of either. So it will have to be a separate genus with its own evolutionary status. Matthew is presently revising all Aussies and when it is certain that Lazarum mirabile (renamed Typhonium mirabile by Peter and myself in 2000) also belongs to this group then the names of all Aussie Typhos will change to Lazarum. Let's wait for Matthew's work to be published and see. That leaves all other former Typhonium species as "proper" Typhonium. The Japanese paper is based on much less material and no Australian ones at all. The evolutionary diagram has a number of unresolved areas and unfortunately, the authors still felt it necessary to divide Typhonium s.l. in no less than 5 genera, of which three new ones, Diversiarum for T. diversifolium, T. alpinum), Pedatyphonium for T. horsfieldii, T. larsenii, T. kunmingense, T. calcicolum, T. omeiense (all these species in my own mind are one T. [Sauromatum as per Cusimano et al.] horsfieldii, and Hirsutiarum for T. hirsutum and T. brevipilosum (both Sauromatum acc. to Cusimano et al.). In short, where Cusimano et al. have expanded Sauromatum on the basis of a fully resolved evolutionary scheme, Ohi-Toma et al. found an unresolved scheme and still decided to create new genera for several Sauromatum species. A decision to create genera based on an unresolved evolutionary scheme is, to say the least, ill-advised. Unresolved evolutionary relationships await further analysis to create a more stable scheme and only then is it useful to make taxonomic decisions leading to changing nomenclature. To boot, the new generic names by Ohi-Toma et al. are all invalidly published because they made a crucial citation mistake with every one of them. The recently published English edition of the Flora of China follows the Cusimano et al. taxonomy and will stand as an authoritative publication. It is a pity that cooperation between the two groups which has been promoted by the Cusimano gang, was not answered by the Japanese-Indian group, or this situation could have been avoided. Anyway, you Typhoniophiles will have to adapt to this new taxonomy. Then again, good ol' Sauromatum venosum is back again! Cheers, Wilbert > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: aroid-l-bounces@gizmoworks.com > [mailto:aroid-l-bounces@gizmoworks.com] Namens arden dearden > Verzonden: vrijdag 21 januari 2011 5:19 > Aan: Discussion of aroids > Onderwerp: Re: [Aroid-l] New aroid in western Australia? > > Steve, > Thank you for bringing this to our attention. > It appears to be an aroid that I saw in Kununurra in 1987 > when I worked there.it appeared to be a Typhonium.There were > some new species described at the time by Alistair Hay.It may > already be described.It grew in thje loamy soil and only > appeared when the wet arrived.It grew with a native Tacca > which the aboriginal people used as a bush potato.They had no > recorded use of the Typhonium. > > Arden > > On 21/01/2011 10:07 AM, Steve Marak wrote: > > I've seen several web hits today on this topic, all of > which seem to > > wind up at the same text. The articles all call the plant an "arum > > lily", don't give a genus or other botanical information, > say that it > > was found in the Kimberly region by Matthew Barrett (Perth's Kings > > Park& Botanic Garden) along with other various new species in that > > remote area, and that the infloresence smells of burnt > electrical wire. > > > > Here's a representative link: > > > > > http://www.perthnow.com.au/news/western-australia/new-lily-found-in-ki > > mberley-smells-like-burnt-electrics/story-e6frg14u-1225991862095 > > > > The picture is *an* aroid, but no idea if it's that aroid; > one of the > > other articles showed a picture of Zantedeschia aethiopica with the > > same text. > > > > Anyone happen to know more about this? I dug through the KP&BG web > > site a bit but didn't find anything. > > > > Steve > > > > -- Steve Marak > > -- samarak@gizmoworks.com > > _______________________________________________ > > Aroid-L mailing list > > Aroid-L@www.gizmoworks.com > > http://www.gizmoworks.com/mailman/listinfo/aroid-l > > > _______________________________________________ > Aroid-L mailing list > Aroid-L@www.gizmoworks.com > http://www.gizmoworks.com/mailman/listinfo/aroid-l _______________________________________________ Aroid-L mailing list Aroid-L@www.gizmoworks.com http://www.gizmoworks.com/mailman/listinfo/aroid-l -- DENI BOWN Consultant Flora & Medicinal Plants International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) Oyo Road PMB 5320 Ibadan Nigeria D.Bown@cgiar.org Work: +234 2 7517472 ext 2520 Mobile (Nigeria) +234 806 0486022 Mobile (UK) +44 787 0345924 --001636831ab2b909f8049a9cc1dd-- --==============596915551334070111=

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