Re: I. tectorum and other crested iris

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Here is a hunch relating to Crested Irises that may be totally off base, but I thought it might be worth a bit of discussion.

 

To me it seems that the Crested Irises are probably indeed closely related to one another, but they are indeed also a diverse lot, not as compact and as closely related to one another as are most of the Beardless to one another or the Bearded to one another.  I wonder if as a group they might represent a diverse but primitive representation of the genus Iris, whereas the Beardless and Bearded groups might represent perhaps more recent, more specialized, and also recently highly successful groups derived from this diverse more primitive group.  To me (maybe totally incorrect) the Crested Group also shows kinships to the other relatives of genus Iris that are usually treated as separate genera.

 

I do not mean this to imply that I think the Crested Iris can not be divided into more than one group based on natural kinships - they likely can; however, I suspect that it will be a difficult job to draw some of the lines between the groupings.  I do think they represent a degree of commonality (and likely something closer to an ancestral state for the genus) than do either the Bearded or the Beardless groups.  I have wondered about the bulbous and Juno Irises as well, which to me seem like they might actually be specializations derived from the same line as the Beardless group (but perhaps not?).  I am inclined to think that a number of the Crested Iris are indeed from the same line of development as the Bearded Iris (case in point is I. tectorum, and probably any of the other Crested types it will cross with), but that perhaps they represent a closer to ancestral branch of the Bearded line of development.

 

Dave