RE: Re: A new crested iris?

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A few more thoughts.
 
There seems to be lots of confusion over Asian Evansia species names, and when I look at photos of plants on the internet it is apparent that there is a lot of confusion as to identities of cultivated plants as well.  I'm not even entirely sure how good my concept of the entities involved is.
 
The name "wattii" has been bounced around quite a bit. In fact there are at least two very different looking types of plant posted to the SIGNA web site under this name. However, I strongly suspect that nobody is really growing true I. wattii. How an apparently smallish Indian plant, got tranformed into a Chinese plant multiple feet tall is indeed a good question.  It's not entirely clear how tall Baker's plants were though.  He does start by saying "tall, stout", but those are highly subjective terms, and I would need to read more of Baker's descriptions (or see the type specimens) to have a better feel for his meaning.  When describing the "stem" he was clearly refering to the inflorescence and not a true stem at all.  I think that it is significant that Dykes (who apparently had type collection material to examine) considered I. wattii a synonym of I. milesii.  I think this implies that the type material of I. wattii must be at least similar in traits and size to that species.  Current interprettation seems to dismiss this similarity to I. milesii out of hand, but it appears to be done without comment or justification, and perhaps the kinship should be reexamined?  I think it was he (and perhaps others?) who stated that the type material actually does have crested falls (sepals).
 
Earlier cultivated specimens out of China, bearing the name I. wattii, were really I. japonica or what is now I. confusa (and plants of those species are still mislabelled as I. wattii sometimes).
 
More recent collections from China called "I. wattii" also seem (to me) to have more in common with I. confusa than with anything else.  "Johnson's clone", and one I found on an Australian web site called "I. japonica 'Sylvia'" (looking nearly identical to 'Johnson's clone' - but perhaps mislabeled) have distinctly drooping falls and a distinctive white (spotted darker) crest, but otherwise they seem to be basically the same sort of cane-producing Chinese things as I. confusa, and I expect they probably aren't that related to the plant originally collected in far eastern India (or perhaps they represent something intermediate in character).
 
There doesn't seem to be any material from the mountains of far eastern India in cultivation at all (???), which is from where the species was actually described, and which would be where the species should be looked for. 
 
The photos from India are from the same region as the type collection of I. wattii, and they would seem to fit the original description at least moderately well, so it seems probable to me that they could be the real I. wattii.  It's hard to get a proper perspective of size from the photos, and I suspect the flowers may appear to be a bit larger than they really are (??).
 
There is type material of Iris wattii deposted in the Central National Herbarium in Howrah, India - not exactly a convenient visit for me - and perhaps (??) at Kew.
 
Dave