Re: naming irises

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Victor notes the eternal friction between splitters and lumpers.
Botanists are sincere over their regard for precision in their taxonomy.

Enter stage gardeners and cultivars and a whole new order of friction
arises. Differences over the basics? L. H. Bailey went to his grave
wishing he had not coined the term 'cultivar'. I'm not fully informed as
to all the causes but I can imagine a few friction points. Botanists go
to great lengths to establish botanical taxa to great depth of audit.
The gardening world has never been cooperative in trying to make
cultivar compatible with such a system of audit. Species can romp around
in the garden literature and not muddle things up? Cultivar cannot do
the same in the botanical literature?

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