Boston Flora

Tag: plant names

  • Thursday, July 20, 5:30 pm – Unraveling the Mysteries Behind Plant Names

    Botanical names hold great power for gardeners; they offer insight for plant identification, cultural growing requirements, and botanical trivia, and allow a means for communicating with gardeners around the world. Still, Latin names can be intimidating to learn, understand, and pronounce. This July 20 talk by new Polly Hill Arboretum Curator Todd Rounsaville will help to simplify the challenging subject of plant names: where do they come from? What do they mean? Why do they change? The lecture will begin at 5:30 at the Arboretum, 809 State Road in West Tisbury. $10 / $5 for PHA members.

  • Sunday, November 10, 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm – Understanding Botanical & Horticultural Names

    In this Arnold Arboretum and New England Wild Flower Society workshop on plant nomenclature, to be held at Garden in the Woods in Framingham on Sunday, November 10 from 1 – 4, students will have the opportunity to sort out the confusion associated with plant names. We will discuss common names, binomial scientific names, and the history of nomenclature since Linnaeus. The current rules of nomenclature will be reviewed, and we’ll see why and how plant names sometimes change.  The instructor is Judith Sumner, PhD, Botanist and author of American Household Botany: A History of Useful Plants 1620 – 1900. Fee for members of the sponsoring organizations is $46, nonmembers $54.  Register at www.arboretum.harvard.edu or at www.newfs.org.

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  • Tuesdays, March 1 – March 29, 6:30 – 8:30 pm – Plant Nomenclature: Determination of the Correct Name of a Known Plant

    In plant names, such as Acer rubrum (red maple), what do the two parts of the name represent? Why do taxonomists change long-accepted plant names and who settles disputes about these names? What is “rule of priority” and why is it rejected occasionally (as in the name of tomato)? What is a ‘type specimen’?

    Dr. Gandhi will answer these questions and more in this introduction to the study of botanical nomenclature and explain the rules of the current international nomenclature code. The classes, on five consecutive Tuesday evenings beginning March 1, will take place at the Harvard University Herbarium, 22 Divinity Avenue in Cambridge, and are sponsored by the Arnold Arboretum.  $120 for Arboretum members, $144 for nonmembers.  You may register by calling 617-384-5277, or emailing adulted@arnarb.harvard.edu.