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Grex (horticulture)

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× Lycamerlycaste Hera gx is a grex of orchid hybrids in the nothogenus × Lycamerlycaste J.M.H.Shaw. It consists of hybrids between members of a grex (× Lycamerlycaste Brugensis gx) and a species (Lycaste cruenta Lindl.).

The term grex (pl. greges or grexes, abbreviation gx), derived from the Latin noun grex, gregis meaning 'flock', has been coined to expand botanical nomenclature to describe hybrids of orchids, based solely on their parentage.[1] Grex names are one of the three categories of plant names governed by the International Code of Nomenclature for Cultivated Plants; within a grex the Groups category can be used to refer to plants by their shared characteristics (rather than by their parentage), and individual orchid plants can be selected (and propagated) and named as cultivars.[2][3]

When the name of a grex is first established, a description is required that specifies two particular parents, where each parent is specified either as a species (or nothospecies) or as a grex.[4] The grex name then applies to all hybrids between those two parents. There is a permitted exception if the full name of one of the parents is known but the other is known only to genus level or nothogenus level.[5]

New grex names are now established by the Royal Horticultural Society, which receives applications from orchid hybridizers.[6][7]

Orchids

In the rare case where a nothospecies name already exists, then a differing grex name cannot be established.[8] Technically a grex differs from a nothospecies in that a nothospecies includes any potential combinations of back-crosses [9] The nothospecies naming convention is limited to identifying that, in some combination, two species are in the background of a nothospecies. In contrast, grex genealogies within Orchids are well known and documented and therefore each successive crossing of a grex to either of the original parent species, results in a new grex with a new genealogy. In both of those example, only two species are known or suspect in the background of the offspring, but grex names document to what degree.

Botanical nomenclature of hybrids

The horticultural nomenclature of grexes exists within the framework of the botanical nomenclature of hybrid plants. Interspecific hybrids occur in nature, and are treated under the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants as nothospecies, ('notho' indicating hybrid). They can optionally be given Linnean binomials with a multiplication sign "×" before the species epithet,[10] for example Crataegus × media. An offspring of the nothospecies, either with the nothospecies or any of the parental species as the other parent, has the same nothospecific name. The nothospecific binomial is an alias for a list of the ancestral species, whether the ancestry is precisely known or not.

For example:

  • a hybrid between Cattleya warscewiczii Rchb.f. 1854 and Cattleya aurea Linden 1883 can be called Cattleya ×hardyana Sander 1883 or simply Cattleya hardyana. An offspring of a Cattleya × hardyana pollenized by another Cattleya × hardyana would also be called Cattleya × hardyana. Cattleya × hardyana would also be the name of an offspring of a Cattleya × hardyana pollenized by either a Cattleya warscewiczii or a Cattleya aurea, or an offspring of either a Cattleya warscewiczii or a Cattleya aurea pollenized by a Cattleya × hardyana.

An earlier term was nothomorph for subordinate taxa to nothospecies. Since the 1982 meeting of the International Botanical Congress, such subordinate taxa are considered varieties (nothovars).

Horticultural treatment of greges

When a hybrid cross is made, all of the seedlings grown from the resulting seed pod are considered to be in the same grex. Any additional plants produced from the hybridization of the same two parents (members of the same species or greges as the original parents) also belong to the grex. Reciprocal crosses are included within the same grex.[12] If a parent of a grex becomes a synonym, any grex names that were established by specifying the synonym are not necessarily discarded; the grex name that was published first is used (the Principle of Priority).[13]

All of the members of a specific grex may be loosely thought of as "sister plants", and just like the brothers and sisters of any family, may share many traits in common or look quite different from one another. This is due to the randomization of genes passed on to progeny during sexual reproduction. The hybridizer who created a new grex normally chooses to register the grex with a registration authority, thus creating a new grex name, but there is no requirement to do this. If two members of the same grex produce offspring, the offspring receive the same grex name as the parents. Individual plants may be given cultivar names to distinguish them from siblings in their grex. Cultivar names are usually given to superior plants with the expectation of propagating that plant. All genetically identical copies of a plant, regardless of method of propagation (divisions or clones) share a cultivar name.

The grex name differs from a specific name in that the gregaric part of the name is capitalized, is not italicized, and may consist of more than one word (limited to 30 characters in total, excluding spaces).[14]

For example: an artificially produced hybrid between Cattleya warscewiczii and C. dowiana (or C. aurea, which the RHS, the international orchid hybrid registration authority, considers to be a synonym of C. dowiana) is called C. Hardyana gx. An artificially produced seedling that results from pollinating a C. Hardyana gx with another C. Hardyana gx is also a C. Hardyana gx. However, the hybrid produced between Cattleya Hardyana gx and C. dowiana is not C. Hardyana gx, but C. Prince John gx. Similarly, the artificial hybrid produced between C. Hardyana gx and C warscewiczii is C. Eleanor gx. In summary:

  • C. Hardyana gx = C. warscewiczii × C. dowiana
  • C. Eleanor gx = C. Hardyana gx × C. warscewiczii
  • C. Prince John gx = C. dowiana × C. Hardyana gx

Because many interspecific (and even intergeneric) barriers to hybridization in the Orchidaceae are maintained in nature only by pollinator behavior, it is easy to produce complex interspecific and even intergeneric hybrid orchid seeds: all it takes is a human motivated to use a toothpick, and proper care of the mother plant as it develops a seed pod. Germinating the seeds and growing them to maturity is more difficult, however.

Grexes within nothospecies

A grex and a nothospecies can have the same parentage, but are not equivalent because the nothospecies includes back-crosses and the grex does not.[15] They can even have the same epithet (distinguished by typography), although since January 2010 it is not permitted to publish such grex names if the nothospecies name already exists.[15]

Hybrids between a grex and a species/nothospecies are named as grexes, but this is not permitted if the nothospecies parent has the same parentage as the grex parent. That situation is a back-cross, and the nothospecies name is applied to the progeny.[15]

See also

References

  1. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 4.1)
  2. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009, p. x)
  3. ^ HORTAX: Cultivated Plant Taxonomy Group, retrieved 30 July 2016
  4. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 4)
  5. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 27.4)
  6. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Appendix 1)
  7. ^ Orchid hybrid registration, Royal Horticultural Society, retrieved 3 August 2016
  8. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 23.5)
  9. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Note 1 page 37)
  10. ^ McNeill, J.; Barrie, F.R.; Buck, W.R.; Demoulin, V.; Greuter, W.; Hawksworth, D.L.; Herendeen, P.S.; Knapp, S.; Marhold, K.; Prado, J.; Prud'homme Van Reine, W.F.; Smith, G.F.; Wiersema, J.H.; Turland, N.J. (2012). International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Melbourne Code) adopted by the Eighteenth International Botanical Congress Melbourne, Australia, July 2011. Vol. Regnum Vegetabile 154. A.R.G. Gantner Verlag KG. ISBN 978-3-87429-425-6.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) Article H1
  11. ^ World Checklist of Selected Plant Families, retrieved 2 August 2016
  12. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 4 Note 2)
  13. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 4.3)
  14. ^ (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 21.13)
  15. ^ a b c (Brickell et al. 2009 & Article 23.5)

Bibliography

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