Lavatera Guy

January comment thread

2010-01-02T11:14:00.001Z

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

Malvaceae in 2009. II. New names, combinations and statuses

2009-12-23T20:46:00.002Z

* In a paper in Lundellia Paul Fryxell introduces the name Abutilon ulbrichii for the Peruvian endemic previous known as Abutilon longipes Ulbr.. The latter name is pre-empted by Abutilon longipes Mattei.

* L.J. Dorr has beaten me to publishing a new name, ×Chiranthomontodendron, for the intergeneric hybrid between Chiranthodendron and Fremontodendron, the previously published names Chiranthofremontia and Leelenzia not being compliant with the International Code for Botanical Nomemclature. (× Chiranthomontodendron: the correct nothogeneric name for the artificial hybrid Chiranthodendron × Fremontodendron (Malvaceae: Malvoideae). Taxon 58(4): 1357-1358). The combination ×Chiranthomontodendron lenzii is published for the cross previously published as ×Chiranthofremontia lenzii

* As a new molecular study implies that there is little hope of disentangling Malva and Lavatera, Clive Stace has grasped the nettle and published the new combination Malva ×clementii for the hybrids between Malva olbia and Malva thuringiaca, in Watsonia.

* Verdcourt had published the new genus and combination Roifia dictyocarpa for Hibiscus dictyocarpus aka Fioria dictyocarpa in the Malvaceae volume of Flora of Tropical East Africa. (Note that Roifia is an anagram of Fioria.) Either he thinks that Fioria is worth two genera (contrasting with Kubitzkia and Bayer, who wrote "probably only a single species"), or he thinks that this is distinct from Hibiscus, but Fioria vitifolia isn't. I'm not going to adopt this name immediately, as while I have no objection to splitting Hibiscus it seems to me to be premature to do so (excepting the Malagasy outliers) until the relationships are better understood, especially in the "Trionum" clade.

* Massimo Bovini has raised Wissadula patens ssp. cuspidata to species rank in Novon 19(1): 15-17 (Una Nueva Especie y Combinación en Wissadula (Malvaceae)).

* Steven Hill has done the same for a couple of forms of Sidalcea, giving rise to Sidalcea celeta and Sidalcea sparsifolia. (Notes on California Malvaceae Including Nomenclatural Changes and Additions to the Flora, Madroño 56(2): 104-111 (2009))

December comment thread

2009-12-22T20:31:00.000Z

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

Web site back online

2009-12-22T20:29:00.001Z

I've found a new hosting company for Malvaceae Info, and it's been back up for about a month.

Malvaceae in 2009. I. New Species

2009-12-22T19:05:00.005Z

* This month the Malvaceae volume of the Flora of Tropical East Africa has been published. I haven't seen it. However new species described in there are listed in the International Plant Name Index.

Abutilon eggelingii Verdc. (pg. 129)
Abutilon pilosicalyx Verdc. (pg. 120)
Abutilon subprostratum Verdc. (pg. 120)
Hibiscus holstii Mwachala (pg. 40)
Hibiscus kabuyeanus Mwachala (pg. 60)
Hibiscus masasianus Mwachala (pg. 68)
Pavonia dimorphostemon Verdc. (pg. 30)

* A new species of Wissadula, W. stipulata, was described by Massimo Bovini in Novon 19(1): 15-17 (Una Nueva Especie y Combinación en Wissadula (Malvaceae))

* Paul Fryxell described Sida calva and Sida florulenta in a paper in which he revises a part of Sida sect. Nelavaga, to which he gives the name of subsect. Conglomerata. (A New South American subsection of Sida sect. Nelavaga (Malvaceae) with Two New Species, Lundellia 12: 15-27)

* Ceiba rubriflora, from the Serra do Ramalho in Bahia in Brazil, is described in a paper in Kew Bulletin (Jefferson Guedes de Carvalho-Sobrinho1 and Luciano Paganucci de Queiroz, Ceiba rubriflora (Malvaceae: Bombacoideae), a new species from Bahia, Brazil, Kew Bulletin 63(4): 649-653). It is distinguished from C. erianthos by the possession of sessile leaflets and red petals.

* Two Malagasy species of Dombeya (D. asymmetrica and D. rienanensis) are described in a second paper in Novon. (Wendy L. Applequist, Two New Species of Dombeya (Malvaceae) from Madagascar, Novon 19(3):289-294)

* Guichenotia anota (which has been around as a manuscript name for a while) is now published in Wilkins, C.F. & Whitlock, B.A., Guichenotia anota and Guichenotia apetala (Lasiopetaleae: Byttneriaceae or Malvaceae s. lat.) a new and a revised species endemic to the Ravensthorpe Range, south-west Western Australia, Nuytsia 19(1): 181–190.

* A 4th Malagasy species of Hildegardia, H. dauphinensis, is described in a paper in Adansonia (John G. Zaborsky, Hildegardia dauphinensis (Malvaceae, Sterculioideae): a new species from southeastern Madagascar, Adansonia, sér. 3, 31 (1) : 143-148). It differs from H. perrieri in possessing "distinctive multi-branched stellate hairs on the calyces and leaves, and in having flat (not revolute) leaf blades".

* A new species of Heliocarpus, H. parvimontis, is described from the Balsas river basin of southern Mexico. (Martha Gual-Díaz y Elizabeth Moreno-Gutiérrez, A new species of Heliocarpus (Tiliaceae) from the Balsas River Basin, Guerrero, Mexico, Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad 80: 283-286)

* A hybrid, Lavatera ×columbretensis, between L. arborea (Malva arborea) and L. mauritanica (M. durieui), is described from a Spanish offshore island. (Ana Juan & Manuel B. Crespo, A New Wild Hybrid in Lavatera (Malvaceae), Flora Montiberica 41: 3-9). The paper is ambiguous on this point - the cytology not yet having been investigated - but I have the impression that this is a true-breeding hexaploid (2n=126) population, and the × could be dropped.

* [Update 30 Dec 09] A new genus, Spirabutilon, and species, S. citrinum, from Espirito Santo in Brasil, has been described by Antonio Krapovickas, in Bonplandia (Corrientes). (Tip of the hat to Professor Fryxell.)

* [Update 02 Jan 10] I forget to mention, because as a fossil species it is not listed in IPNI, the description of a third fossil species of Craigia, C. hainanensis, from Hainan island.

April comment thread

2009-04-11T20:39:00.001+01:00

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

Hibiscus diversity

2009-03-29T20:51:00.002+01:00

It is not clear what the appropriate bounds for the genus Hibiscus are, Bernard Pfeil and coworkers having found that several genera (including the large genus Pavonia) are nested within Hibiscus, and Margaret Koopman having found that a clade consisting of some Malagasy species of Hibiscus and some endemic Malagasy genera is the sister group to the rest of Hibiscus and its embedded genera. However, I have been building a list of Malvaceae species of the world, and my tally for Hibiscus, under the Kubitzki and Bayer circumscription (I'm approproaching the point of grasping a couple of nettles and sinking Symphochlamys and Macrostelia), has reached approximately 400 species, which exceeds the figures usually given in the literature (300 is the upper bound of the numbers I've seen). This would make Hibiscus comfortably the largest genus in the family, well ahead of Abutilon, Sida, Pavonia and Sterculia. For individual sections I now have a tally of 79 species for Bombicella, and 107 for Furcaria (estimates of species diversity for this section run up to 150 species). No other section has nearly as many species as these, but between them all, and the nearly 100 species for which I haven't seen sectional affiliations the total of 400 is reached. I've written up short web pages on sections Bombicella and Lilibiscus

New web page

2008-10-12T21:32:00.001+01:00

Paradombeya Notes, covering two species of dombeyoid plants from China and SE Asia.

Intergeneric hybrids in Malvaceae

2008-10-05T09:49:00.001+01:00

I've put together a page outlining what I know about intergeneric hybrids in Malvaceae.

October comment thread

2008-10-05T09:48:00.001+01:00

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

Alcea pallida

2008-08-09T09:56:00.005+01:00

Over the years I've attempted to grow from seed various hollyhocks, including Alcea pallida, other than forms of the common Alcea rosea, but generally without success in keeping the plants until they reached flowering size. (I have a plant of "kurdica" currently flowering.)

However, yesterday, in a garden centre I came across a few plants labelled as Alcea pallida. (As they looked nearly dead I didn't buy any.) The flowers are quite distinct from Alcea rosea; they are markedly smaller, and the petals are narrow (non-overlapping) and distinctly bilobed.

August comment thread

2008-08-09T09:56:00.001+01:00

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

May comment thread

2008-05-09T11:16:00.001+01:00

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

Propagation - seed sowing

2008-04-15T16:13:00.002+01:00

What with the cool spring I've been rather tardy in sowing seed this year, but I've got round to sowing 15 batches of Eumalvas.

1) Malva australiana, of a strain originally collected in New South Wales
2) Malva australiana, of a strain originally collected in Western Australia, or at least sold by a West Australian seed company.
3) Malva pusilla, of a strain originally collected in Champaign, Illinois
4) Malva parviflora, of a strain originally collected in Victoria, Australia
5) Malva nicaeensis
6) Malva nicaeensis (a pale flowered form)
7) Malva sylvestris Hinsley 53 [1] x linnaei Davis s.n. (strain Brythone)
8) Malva sylvestris Hinsley 53 [1] x linnaei Davis s.n. (strain P/1)
9) Malva arborea [3] 'Variegata' x australiana
10) Malva arborea 'Variegata' x durieui
11) Malva arborea 'Variegata' x linnaei Davis s.n. (strain P/3)
12) Malva arborea Davis s.n. [2] x sylvestris Hinsley 60 [4]
13) Malva sylvestris 'Mystic Merlin' x durieui
14) Malva sylvestris 'Mystic Merlin' x durieui
15) Malva sylvestris 'Mystic Merlin' x durieui

Numbers 7-9 and 13-15 are old batches of seed from which hybrid plants have been successfully raised in past years. Numbers 9-12 are seed from last year's attempts to produce hybrids and may turn out to be just Malva arborea - while Malva arborea is not mechanically self-compatible in the way the small-flowered speciesa are, previous attempts to produce hybrids using this as the seed parent have produced Malva arborea.

[1] Hinsley 53 was a small-flowered, nearly male-sterile, selection of Malva sylvestris 'Mystic Merlin'.
[2] collected in Cornwall
[3] better known as Lavatera arborea
[4] Hinsley 60 is a hybrid between a wild-collection (Hinsley 3), and a cultivated form thought to be 'Bibor Felho'.

April Comment Thread

2008-04-05T23:42:00.001+01:00

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

New images in gallery

2008-03-24T12:34:00.001Z

I've added images from Wikimedia Commons of Ceiba pentandra, Grewia crenata, Grewia tenax, Heritiera littorialis and Talipariti tiliaceum. See recent changes.

Sterculia images

2008-03-12T13:32:00.000Z

I've picked up a few public domain/GFLD/Creative Commons images from WikiMedia Commons for the Sterculia Gallery.

Hibiscus

2008-03-11T01:41:00.000Z

Another plant from Fullerton Arboretum. I'd place it as a cultivar of Hibicus rosa-sinensis, possibly (note the toothed petal apices) with some Hibiscus schizopetalus in its ancestry, but perhaps there's a Hibiscus expert that knows better.

flower

Malviflora of Angola

2008-03-10T14:44:00.001Z

When I collated data on the Malviflora of South Africa a while back I wasn't able to find much information of the flora of Angola. Since then I found a copy of W.P. Hiern's Catalog of Welwitsch's African Plants at Internet Archive. Over the weekend I've extracted the data from there, and integrated it into the Malviflora of South Africa pages.

This doubled the number of species in Angola per my records. While the list may well still be incomplete it is comparable in size with that for other South African countries, so it should at least be a reasonable representation of the diversity.

Google Search was used to evaluate the names used by Hiern for current validity. It turns out that Aluka has a considerable amount of data on the synonymies of African Plants (from the Floras of West Tropical and East Tropical Africa). It looks as if I'll have to dig into this someday and update my nomenclatural databases. The Flora of East Tropical Africa also has extralimital ranges, so I may be able to identify further Angolan species from there.

Sidalcea review

2008-03-10T14:29:00.000Z

I've been round the garden and allotment to check which of my Sidalceas have survived the winter (though it's more a case of which weren't mortally injured by last summer's floods.

Most of the losses have been of forms of Sidalcea candida and Sidalcea oregana. I've lost completely 'Bianca', 'Rosanna', and 'Rosy Gem', and the majority of plants of 'Party Girl' and 'Purpetta' and lines of candida (ex Ness Botanic Gardens seed list) and oregana (ex RHS seed list). Apart from these, one speciment of 'Oberon' is looking unhappy, and my only specimen of 'Little Princess' is not yet showing any growth.

Plants which has survived include 'Elsie Heugh' (4 plants), 'Rosebud' (2), 'Mrs. Borrodaile' (4), 'Wine Red' (2), 'William Smith' (2), 'Rosaly, 'Sussex Beauty' (2), 'Candy Girl' (2) and an identified variety (mislabelled 'Elsie Heugh' when bought) (44).

Of 40 self-sown seedlings of 'Rosebud' which were transplanted to 13cm pots 39 survived; I also have another 25 in smaller pots. Due to the ill effects of last summer's flooding there was less seed production, but I can still see some seedlings coming up near the parent plants.

If also have seedlings of 'Brilliant' (self-down), 'Jimmy Whittet', 'Mrs. Borrodaile' and 'William Smith' from last year.

Dombeya macrantha

2008-03-10T13:59:00.003Z

I've been asked to identify another plant, photographed at the Fullerton Arboretum in California.

It has a trimerous laciniate epicalyx, 5 narrow sepals with a stellate indumentum, 5 red petals spirally arranged in a cup-shaped corolla, pentadelphous stamens placed antepetalously, and a gynoecium somewhat obscured by the androecium. The foliage is hairy, and bronzed when young. Obviously not a mallow except in the broadest sense.

Once I had convinced myself it was a dombeyoid I cheated and looked in the collections database on the Fullerton Arboretum website, comparing the 5 species of Dombeya held (it clearly wasn't either of the other two dombeyoids - Pentapetes phoenicea and Trochetiopsis ebenus - held by the institution). It turns out to be Dombeya macrantha, known by the Germans as Madagaskar Linde.

The photographs are - foliage, side view of part open flower, oblique view of flower, front view of flower, young leaves, side view of opening flower

March Comment Thread

2008-03-01T16:53:00.000Z

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

Herrisantia crispa?

2008-02-25T23:58:00.005Z

I've just received an email with a request for identification, of a couple of photographs of a plant from Key Largo.

It's not a species that I immediately recognise, but it's something in Abutilinae, and on first thought I suspected an Abutilon of some description. However after a little digging around the US malviflora I now suspect Herissantia crispa. Can anyone confirm or correct?

Update: Professor Fryxell confirms that it is Herissantia crispa.

First picture - assorted fruits and leaves

Second picture - a lonely flower

February Comment Thread

2008-02-24T19:11:00.001Z

For general comments and questions related to Malvaceae from anyone.

February Frosts

2008-02-24T14:30:00.005Z

In the middle of February there were a few nights with hard, penetrating, frost (5-8 degrees Celsius of frost). I won't know for a while how much damage has been done, but a few plants from my collection are looking unhappy - a Lavatera × clementii 'Candy Floss' (which may be the tenderest of the common cultivars), one (of several) Alcalthaea × suffrutescens 'Park Rondell', some small Malva dendromorpha (Lavatera arborea) seedlings, and an Abutilon 'Kentish Belle'.

Some Malva 'Bicolor' and Malva 'Princesse de Lignes' looked sick for a few days, but have recovered.

Over at the allotment I think that the cold spell saw off a few more "Eumalvas".

Introduction

2008-02-24T14:30:00.003Z

For some years I have been presenting and extending a web site on the Malvaceae or Mallow Family, a family of flowering plants, firstly at space provided by my ISP, and subsequently at the domain www.malvaceae.info. The scope of that site is the Malvaceae sensu APG, that is not only mallows, abutilons, cottons and hibiscuses, but also the great majority of plants formerly classified in Bombacaceae, Sterculiaceae and Tiliaceae.

This blog is created for publishing material that is of too ephemeral a nature to fit comfortably within the structure of the web site, and for communication with the readers of the website.