I am confused. If a species is divided into subspecies, are there still individuals of that species that may not belong to any of them? For example, can I assume that every H australis belongs to one of the defined subspecies, or are there plants which are simply H australis?
Taxonomy terminology question
Sofi....this is how I understand it and can explain it:
You make a cake with certain ingredients. You bake that cake and it becomes Chocolate Cake. It will always just be a Chocolate Cake. Then...you decide you will take parts of the batter and add, say, dried strawberries to it. Then it becomes Chocolate Cake with Strawberries. Etc. The size, shape, taste are different enough that you can no longer call it just Chocolate Cake.
H. australis is a very large and varied species...but they all share defining traits such as pollinia, stamin, calyx for example. But...their leaf shapes, growth habits etc. are different...so they become all subspecies of H. australis. H. australis ssp. australis, ssp. tenuipes, ssp. orimacola, ssp. rupicola etc. The ssp. differ enough from one another that they are a SUBspecies, and not just a sport or a clone with little difference.
There are also var. (variety) of a species...and I am still putting all that information together to post. My recollection is that 'var.' was used before ssp. came into play, or it means the same...or....?
ANYONE...feel free to correct me on this....and add more info.
Sofi, all of the australis's belong to one ssp. or another. I believe that when a species has any supspecies named, it automatically has a subspecies with its own name made. For instance, if you have H. australis, as the original named plant, and you find another australis that differs and you name it as a subspecies, say H. australis ssp. oramicola, then the original plant automatically becomes H. australis ssp. australis, which is just a more precise way of saying the original version of australis.
Carol, thank you for your reply, especially the great analogy that you used to illustrate. I am happy to leave the "variety" distinctions alone for now! Mark, you answered precisely the question that I had.
I must have read at least 100 definitions of the term "subspecies" but none of them gave me the information that your answer did. Many thanks.
Found some confirmation on the ssp. question- I was pretty sure but as Sofi noted the definitions of word from the encyclopedia don't always tell the whole story. This is taken from an MSN post on H. calycina ssp. calycina, between mattadeus5 and Chris Burton.
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"I have a plant of Hoya calycina subsp. calycina which I enjoy very much and would be interested to know what the main differences are between this and Hoya calycina
thanks,
Matt
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Reply
No difference. When you say Hoya calycina without adding a subspecies name, you are implying that the one you refer to is Hoya calycina subsp. calycina."
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So there you have it! Thanks Chris.
I guess this explains why I have seen so many subspecies names that are the same as the species. Thanks once again.