Rob Halgren wrote in message ...
TU wrote:

Hi paph growers,

I need assistance to ID my paph. I have 2 paph in my small collection,
they are labelled as Paph villosum and Paph callosum. I'm told there
are subtle differences between villosum and boxalii but I don't know
enough abou them to tell them apart. I'm wondering if you could check
the link below and tell me if they are in fact Paph boxalii and Paph
callosum var sublaeve (sp?) or any other variety?
Any comments would be much appreciated.
TIA

Tong

http://au.photos.yahoo.com/bc/tung_001


I'd disagree with Ray on the 'boxalii'. That is classic villosum
in my opinion. Looks like somw of the ones I have, anyway.
(http://www.msu.edu/~halgren/Pictures/villosum_pair.jpg). I don't have
my books here at work, but I seem to recall that boxalii has a distinct
green/white tooth on the staminode.
Of course, being an out of the taxonomic closet lumper, I put
callosum and sublaeve together. I would doubt the merit of changing
your tags, chances are the tags are as correct as the grower can make
them. It is much more profitable to sell 'rare' varieties, so if they
were, chances are good that they would have been sold as such. Of
course that leads to a lot of grower induced taxonomy as well (not
always a good thing). And, if one makes a cross with callosum, and
'sublaevae' come out as part of the progeny, that doesnt say much for
the validity of the sublaevae concept.

Rob (one hand today. Grafting knives are sharp...)



Thanks Ray and Rob for your comments. Looks like it'd be best to leave
the tags as they are for now. I bought the plants last year, stating
that I wanted Paph villosum and straight Paph callosum, not var
sublaevae.
It'd nice to know one way or the other that I'm dealing with a
reputable nursery.

Tong