How does one determine why a plant's scientific name has been
changed in recent years? Is there some journal (online or not)
that is the official record-keeper of these changes?

I saw an usual vine in flower yesterday, and could not find it
in my Newcombe's wildflower guide. Fortunately it was in the
pictorial guide "Wildflowers of the Shenandoah Valley and Blue
Ridge Mountains" by Gupton and Swope, as Gonolobus obliquus.
Checking other, more recent references, (Vascular Flora of the
Carolinas, West Virginia Flora, plants.usda.gov), it appears
that this genus has been renamed to Matelea. I would like to
know when and why, and most importantly, the significance of
the term "Matelea."

-David Cox

How does one determine why a plant's scientific name has been
changed in recent years? Is there some journal (online or not)

This is why serious gardeners become babbling idiots. There are two main
reasons why a plant name gets changed. One is the law of priority. A botanist
does his homework & finds that a supposedly recently discovered plant was
actually named years ago. In that case the older name must be used. The other
main reason is that a plant may have been assigned to a certain genus, but
subsequent research leads to the genus being broken up, or a species being
transferred from one genus to another. This is the main resource I use:
http://www.ipni.org/ipni/query_ipni.html
buth there are others. See the mini-FAQ.

the official record-keeper of these changes?

For flowering plants it is Index Kewensis.

Iris,
Central NY, Zone 5a, Sunset Zone 40
"If we see light at the end of the tunnel, It's the light of the oncoming
train."
Robert Lowell (1917-1977)

Woodson (1940) used the genus Matelea as a dumping ground for several
anomalous genera and aberrant species in the New World Gonolobeae and many
authors still follow his classification, warts and all. Although there has
been much discussion in the literature about reinstating and redefining a
number of genera in this group, the status of several species still remains
unsettled. Supposedly W.D. Stevens had written up a revision of the group in
the 1980's but his results still remain mostly unpublished.

See the following article for a detailed discussion of the taxonomic
problems in the North American species in the group.

Rosatti, T.J. (1989) THE GENERA OF SUBORDER APOCYNINEAE (APOCYNANCEAE AND
ASCLEPIADACEAE) IN THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES : ASCLEPIADACEAE. Journal
of the Arnold Arboretum 70 (4): 443-514, figs. 6-9.





"David Hamilton Cox" wrote in message
...
How does one determine why a plant's scientific name has been
changed in recent years? Is there some journal (online or not)
that is the official record-keeper of these changes?

I saw an usual vine in flower yesterday, and could not find it
in my Newcombe's wildflower guide. Fortunately it was in the
pictorial guide "Wildflowers of the Shenandoah Valley and Blue
Ridge Mountains" by Gupton and Swope, as Gonolobus obliquus.
Checking other, more recent references, (Vascular Flora of the
Carolinas, West Virginia Flora, plants.usda.gov), it appears
that this genus has been renamed to Matelea. I would like to
know when and why, and most importantly, the significance of
the term "Matelea."

-David Cox

the official record-keeper of these changes?

Iris Cohen schreef
For flowering plants it is Index Kewensis.

+ + +
No, there is no official record-keeper, which was what the Battle of St
Louis (1999) was about. De facto the Index Kewensis (online as www.ipni.org)
serves as record-keeper for newly published names. But do see the Mini FAQ

I assume Matelea was named for a Mr (possibly Mrs) Matele, likely to be
French.
PvR