Sternbergia 2011

[Oakwood]

Hello!  It's my Sternbergia colchiciflora found in Crimea. At me this one flowers from the end of August. My Moldavian clone of it flowers usually from the beginning of October. Last year summer Crimean plants didn't bloom, just making cleistogamic seed pods in spring...

[JoshY46013]

So out of the eight accepted species they're all thought to be forms of S. lutea?

[Ezeiza]

A species by Ravenna with absolutely no scientific standing? Are you sure?

[Maggi Young]

Sternbergia minoica Ravenna, Onira 5: 39 (2001)
 
http://www.theplantlist.org/tpl/record/kew-287791
http://www.ipni.org/ipni/idPlantNameSearch.do?id=1018839-1           

 

[Ezeiza]

Maggi, my limited English does not let me be sarcastic enough.

There is a problem of long time, that Kew accepts taxa as valid with intriguing criteria.

[Maggi Young]

My personal opinion is that they are all the same, Alberto.

Since I have no bias against little smileys to help my meaning, I will add this....... 

[Gerry Webster]

So out of the eight accepted species they're all thought to be forms of S. lutea?

No - I was commenting only on forms regarded as  S. sicula (& S. greuteriana). Sorry if my post was misleading.
This is the paper to which I was referring:
EWAN GAGE and PAUL WILKIN
A morphometric study of species delimitation in Sternbergia lutea (Alliaceae, Amaryllidoideae) and its allies S. sicula and S. greuteriana
Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 158, 460–469 (2008),

[Pascal B]

Gerry,

That is a rather peculiar use of morphometrics..... I know particularly Japanese taxonomists can loose themselves in cladistic analysis but to use purely morphometrics for species delimitation is new to me. Given the relatively similar shape of Sternbergia flowers I can't really imagine how they could have arrived at any acceptable conclusion.....?

[Gerry Webster]

Gerry,

That is a rather peculiar use of morphometrics..... I know particularly Japanese taxonomists can loose themselves in cladistic analysis but to use purely morphometrics for species delimitation is new to me. Given the relatively similar shape of Sternbergia flowers I can't really imagine how they could have arrived at any acceptable conclusion.....?

Pascal - perhaps you should read the paper. Here is the abstract:

"The morphological chararacters used to differentiate the species Sternbergia lutea (L.) Ker Gawl. ex Spreng., Sternbergia sicula Tineo ex Guss. and Sternbergia greuteriana Kamari & R.Artelari were found not to possess discrete or consistently different states during an attempt to produce an electronic multi-access key to the genus. Thus, variation in floral and leaf morphology in the three species was further explored to re-evaluate taxon limits using herbarium specimens and statistical methods, including principal components analysis (PCA) and elliptic Fourier analysis (EFA). This confirmed that variation was continuous between the three species. Sternbergia sicula and S. greuteriana are sunk into S. lutea and a revised description provided. It is suggested that cultivar status is the most appropriate rank for the cultivated forms of the S. lutea complex."

[pehe]

Hello!  It's my Sternbergia colchiciflora found in Crimea. At me this one flowers from the end of August. My Moldavian clone of it flowers usually from the beginning of October. Last year summer Crimean plants didn't bloom, just making cleistogamic seed pods in spring...

Nice colchiciflora Dima!
It is just the opposite here - no flowers this year, only leaves (and possible seed pods under ground). Last year they flowered nicely.

Poul

[Gerry Webster]

Pascal - further to my previous post, Gage & Wilkin have now published a phylogenetic analysis. Unfortunately, I can only access the abstract online:

EWAN GAGE, PAUL WILKIN, MARK W. CHASE, JULIE HAWKINS
Phylogenetic systematics of Sternbergia (Amaryllidaceae) based on plastid and ITS sequence data

Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society 166, (Issue 2), 149–162, ( 2011)

"The phylogenetics of Sternbergia (Amaryllidaceae) were studied using DNA sequences of the plastid ndhF and matK genes and nuclear internal transcribed spacer (ITS) ribosomal region for 38, 37 and 32 ingroup and outgroup accessions, respectively. All members of Sternbergia were represented by at least one accession, except S. minoica and S. schubertii, with additional taxa from Narcissus and Pancratium serving as principal outgroups. Sternbergia was resolved and supported as sister to Narcissus and composed of two primary subclades: S. colchiciflora sister to S. vernalis, S. candida and S. clusiana, with this clade in turn sister to S. lutea and its allies in both Bayesian and bootstrap analyses. A clear relationship between the two vernal flowering members of the genus was recovered, supporting the hypothesis of a single origin of vernal flowering in Sternbergia. However, in the S. lutea complex, the DNA markers examined did not offer sufficient resolving power to separate taxa, providing some support for the idea that S. sicula and S. greuteriana are conspecific with S. lutea"

[Ezeiza]

A lot of chitchat to express the same Maggi said in one short sentence.

[Pascal B]

A lot of chitchat to express the same Maggi said in one short sentence.

Alberto, based on the morphometric article for the 3 mentioned species, yes. Based on the phylogenetic analysis for the entire genus the abstract however reports 2 subclades, one with 3 species and 1 with lutea and allies (if I interpret it correctly). The lutea subclade was not sufficiently resolved with the used markers which could mean a. they are a single species in that subclade or b. different markers are needed. The second option sounds strange because in the first subclade the markers were able to do so and that probably lead the authors to suspect all taxa in the lutea subclade are conspecific. But the sample density seems low and 2 taxa were not sequenced so it probably needs some additional sequencing to be sure.

However, to say they are all 1 single species seems, based on the abstract of the phylogeny at least, not entirely justified.

[Oakwood]

Hello!  It's my Sternbergia colchiciflora found in Crimea. At me this one flowers from the end of August. My Moldavian clone of it flowers usually from the beginning of October. Last year summer Crimean plants didn't bloom, just making cleistogamic seed pods in spring...

Nice colchiciflora Dima!
It is just the opposite here - no flowers this year, only leaves (and possible seed pods under ground). Last year they flowered nicely.

Poul

Thanks Poul, and when exactly did they flower at you last year? in September, or later? cause this Crimean clone I suppose flowers from August (if flowers current year))))

[pehe]

Dima,
I have two clones of colchiciflora, one from Janis Ruksans and one from Paul Christian.  Last year the first one started flowering August the 27Th and the other in the middle of September. Both under glass.

Poul