Taxonomic change for the Family Taxodiaceae

fyi. Taxodiaceae family has been changed to Cupressaceae with seven subfamilies:
- Callitroideae Saxton (Callitris, Neocallitropsis, Diselma, Widdringtonia, and Libocedrus)
- Athrotaxidoideae Quinn (Athrotaxis)
- Cunninghamioideae (Sieb. & Zucc.) Quinn (Cunninghamia)
- Cupressoideae Rich. ex Sweet (Cupressus, Juniperus, Xanthocyparis, Microbiota, Platycladus, Tetraclinis, Calocedrus, Chamaecyparis, Fokiena, Thuja and Thujopsis)
- Sequoioideae (Luerss.) Quinn (Sequoia, Sequoiadendron, and Metasequoia)
- Taiwanioideae (Hayata) Quinn (Taiwania)
- Taxodioideae Endl. ex K. Koch (Taxodium, Glyptostrobus, and Cryptomeria)
A full description of these changes can be found here: http://www.conifers.org/cu/
RHS database reflects this change: http://www.rhs.org.uk/databases/summary.asp
Mobot is partially changed over: http://mobot.mobot.org/W3T/Search/vast.html

The genus Sciadopitys (Japanase Umbella Pine), which was found to be completely unlike the Cupressaceae, and is now placed in the monotypic family Sciadopityaceae.

I've updated PlantFiles to reflect this change. I just thought some of you might wanna know.

pic: Glyptostrobus pensilis

Also Actinostrobus, Fitzroya, Papuacedrus, and Pilgerodendron


A synonym of the earlier name Callitropsis, though perhaps better included within Cupressus*.
The name Xanthocyparis has been proposed for conservation over Callitropsis by the next International Botanical Congress, though this is unlikely to be approved given the recent transfer by D. P. Little** of all the American Cupressus species to Callitropsis (conservation of Xanthocyparis over Callitropsis would result in all of these needing renaming yet again, which would be regarded as unwelcome by the IBC voting committee).

* See e.g. Xiang, Q.-P. & Li, J.-H. (2005). Derivation of Xanthocyparis and Juniperus from within Cupressus: Evidence from Sequences of nrDNA Internal Transcribed Spacer Region. Harvard Papers in Botany 9 (2): 375-382, where Vietnamese Cypress is published as Cupressus vietnamensis (Farjon) Xiang & Li, and also Jagel, A., & Stuetzel, T. (2001). Zur Abgrenzung von Chamaecyparis Spach und Cupressus L. (Cupressaceae) und die systematische Stellung von Cupressus nootkatensis D.Don. Feddes Repertorium 112 (1-4): 179-229, where strong evidence for treatment of Nootka Cypress within Cupressus is given.
**Little, D. P. (2006). Evolution and Circumscription of the True Cypresses (Cupressaceae : Cupressus). Systematic Botany 31 (3): 461-480.

Resin

edit: typo


This message was edited Sep 24, 2007 9:56 PM

Well. That will take some getting used to. I'm curious as to how these determinations were made. Was it DNA/genome sequencing? I would imagine a lot of stuff would get moved around taxonomically once sequenced.

AhHa. Resin, I think you answered my question in your references. You replied while I was trying to make sure I spelled genome correctly.

The merger of Taxodiaceae into Cupressaceae was actually made some time ago (1976) on morphological grounds (Eckenwalder, J. E. 1976. Re-evaluation of Cupressaceae and Taxodiaceae: A proposed merger. Madroño 23:237-256); more recently it has been repeatedly confirmed from both genetic and additional morphological evidence (e.g. Gadek, P. A., Alpers, D. L., Heslewood, M. M., & Quinn, C. J. 2000. Relationships within Cupressaceae sensu lato: a combined morphological and molecular approach. American Journal of Botany 87 (7): 1044-1057).

Resin

I was just getting used to Xanthocyparis let alone thinking Taxodium distichum is Cupressaceae. It does, though, make sense to have Sciadopitys on its own.

The interesting thing is that Linnaeus was right, all along . . . he described Baldcypress as Cupressus disticha: http://www.botanicus.org/page/359024

Resin

The dish tonight is Corvus brachyrhynchos for those who continually derided, berated, condescended to, and generally called ingnorant yahoos those who used common names. I already know what you will say "but this is different.." mmm hmm!

Yeah, it's a lot more stable to just stick to Nootka Cypress, instead of sorting between Cupressus nootkatensis, Callitropsis nootkatensis, Xanthocyparis nootkatensis, Chamaecyparis nootkatensis . . .


trouble is, then along comes someone else who claims it is a cedar Cedrus!!

If you visited here, everyone would say it's a cedar. You might find someone who calls it a Yellow Cedar to tell it apart from the Western Red Cedar but not from True Cedars (Cedrus). Let's hope the taxonomists don't mess with it anymore.

OK so here is a practical question. I bought most of my guides about 8 years ago. I am talking trees and wildflowers both. I think I have 3 of each. Has enough changed so that I should bite the bullet and buy new ones? This is just a hobby with me, but although I don't mind being a yahoo, I like to be able to look it up and find the correct answer. On the other hand, we are talking money if I replace them all.

On a similar subject does anyone know a good recent quide to Mexican wildflowers? The best I have found so far is black & white from 1950s.

Time for HORTUS IV

Perhaps an electronic only version that would allow for easier editing to accomodate additional taxonomic changes. More are certain to follow.

Yes, but that won't work for the wildflowers anyway because I use them in the field. I am a wildflower volunteer for the metroparks. Or maybe I could actually carry one around on one of those thingys people have plugged into their ears, not too technological here!

That's just plain wrong, though - they're not cedars at all. Time to improve education in the area!

Resin

shadowgarden - I wasn't suggesting that Hortus III would be useful for botanizing in the field. Just that it might be time for Hortus IV since its been 31 years. Is Newcomb's still useful? Its been a while since I did a stint with the metroparks (Kitty Todd, Irwin Prairie, Oak Openings, Wildwood) but that's what we used. Since I can't walk and chew gum at the same time, sticking earphones in my ears while navigating the fields and woods would definitely not be hel[pful. Besides, you'd miss the bird calls.

You know it is interesting, Newcomes is good because you can key plants, however they must have a flower in bloom for it to work. But if you get it down to two or three and can't figure out what you have got, Petersons is better because his drawings emphasize the parts that help you distinguish between one species and another. When neither of these work I go to Audabon which has actual photos. Usually photos are not actually as helpful to me as drawings in deciding what plant I have but sometimes when I look at the photos I get an overall sense enough to say "Well its certainly not that!" Occasionally I will post photos here or on the garden web and someone almost always knows (usually Patrick for flowers). Once I was stumped for several weeks and was flipping through a big old coffeetable book with drawings by Homer House when I found the plant I was trying to identify. (This book is gorgeous, about 80 years old, I love it.) So you never know.

My goodness it's been longer than I thought! I completely forgot about Peterson's. There is something so satisfying about puzzling out a plant ID. Even though you know its been done before by others, its still a neat thing.

And remember that if you buy new books, make sure they have been updated, and not just reprinted.