P.S., that was good point about the grex registration system's inflexibility
of structure compared with what seems to be taxonomy's fluid structure. The
two systems do not play well together, that's for sure. I think the
registrar was testing the waters when he made the genus level changes in the
Oncidium group. It was unprecedented to go back in the records and make
wholesale changes. But the orchid world did not end or really even seem to
notice. The mass production vendors still call it Colmanara Wildcat. It
was also one of the least disruptive of the wholesale changes looming in the
records that he could have chosen to confront.

wrote in message
oups.com...
Diana Kulaga wrote:
Have you seen the current issue of Orchids? Have you? Did you know that
aurantiaca and skinneri are no longer Cattleyas? Huh? Huh? Ditto
bowringiana.

And on pg. 659 - top right photo and lower half of the page - what kind
of
labeling is that?

"Guarianthe (syn. Cattleya) x guatemalensis 'Barbara Sullivan' CCM/AOS
(skinneri x aurantiaca)"

And on pg 661, they identify bowringiana in one picture as "C." and in
the
one below as Guarianthe (syn. Cattleya).

As far as I can tell, the picture on 661 is the only error. Everywhere
else, the species are listed as Guarianthe bowringiana, G. aurantiaca,
etc. When used in hybrids, they're listed as Guarianthe (syn.
Cattleya). Presumably the "syn. Cattleya" reflects the fact that the
grex names have not been changed wholesale: Guarianthe bowringiana x
C. Armstrongiae is still Cattleya Porcia.

Some of the recent molecular work on which the taxonomy is based can be
found in this paper:
http://www.cassiovandenberg.com/pdfs...enbergetal.pdf
As best I can tell, if the C. bowringiana group remain in Cattleya,
then Rhyncholaelia and, possibly, Brassavola, would also need to be
folded into Cattleya. That would muck up the nomenclature of hybrids
almost as much, and it wouldn't solve all the problems, because a
couple of the unifoliate cattleyas are closer to the Brazilian laelias
than to other cattleyas.

I find a certain appeal in an extreme lumper approach which would place
all of Cattleya, Laelia, Brassavola, Rhyncholaelia, and Sophronitis in
a single genus. That way, all the fiddly inter-relationships among the
smaller groups could be worked out without disturbing the genus-level
taxonomy.

If you want to blame something, blame the grex registration system
which makes the nomenclature of orchid hybrids dependent on scientific
nomenclature that was developed when the plants were first described
and were poorly understood. It's hardly surprising that the
nomenclature needs to be revised in light of new data. If orchids used
a cultivar system like most other ornamental plant groups, it wouldn't
matter so much if the genus changed. Perhaps a better solution would
have been a simplified Grex system where all Cattleya alliance hybrids
get a single hybrid genus name (e.g. Cattleyahybrid, or something).
But, it's too late now.

I kind of like Guarianthe. It commemorates the local Spanish name for
the plants, instead of some long dead Englishman. But, I'm not
changing my tags yet.

Nick