Re: I. versicolor

 

I agree that Edgar Anderson cannot be honored enough. I would reccommend his popular book Plants, Man, and Life which was published in 1952. Although I read it as a teenager, it was one of the works that convinced me I would like to go into Botany. As I remember it was very strong on Ethnobotany, plant ecology and Taxonomy but was written for a popular audience. Anderson had many ideas that seemed to be ignored today. For example he considered herbarium specimens even of cultivated plants to be important. Sadly many botanists are not interested in gardeners, but Dr. Anderson helped foster the American Iris Society and it was said of him if you were walking the grounds of Missouri Botanical Garden, that he would stop and talk to visitors, always kind and available.

Dr. Anderson collected many clones of Iris cristata that now grow in the MO Bot Arboretum in Grey Summitt Mo. One of these was offered in a plant sale and it turned out to be the most vigorous clone I grew. I sent it to Marty and Jan Sacks with my reccommendation and I asked them to distributed it under the name Edgar Anderson.

From: gndavis@peoplepc.com
To: iris-species@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, October 13, 2011 10:32:55 PM
Subject: Re: [iris-species]  I. versicolor

 

ï

Iris Species Group
I have followed the thread regarding Iris setosa / and potentially related species such as versicolor, with interest. For those interested in such things, here is a little bit of  additional perspective as I understand it.
 
The substantial connection of Species Iris with Edgar Anderson actually goes considerably further than Setosa. Anderson studied the origin of Lousiana Iris as well in developing his general population genetics and species origin theories. Now acclaimed as historically important work in plant science. One of his books "Introgressive Hybridization" involved extensive studies with the origin of Lousiana iris. Anderson and Fisher (another great scientist) were instrumental in literally developing the fledgling science of population genetics following establishment of Mendelian principles of genetic inheritance. R.A. Fisher, colleague and contemporary of Anderson, was one of the worlds great statisticians. Fisher shared an interest in population genetics with Anderson. It was Fisher who developed many statistical methods that permitted population genetics to be understood through mathematical modeling and statistical interpretation of massive amounts of plant data. Little wonder Anderson and Fisher were widely quoted in their day, as now. ( as Chuck noted ) These were two of the most influential plant geneticists of the last century - little celebrated in my opinion, but historically important none-the-less. It might be said that Anderson and Fisher were to population genetics what Watson and Crick later became to DNA when they discovered and described function of the universal code of life. In his quest Anderson used Iris species as model plants for his botanical investigations.
 
irisman646
gregdavis
 
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From: r*@yahoo.com
To: i*@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, October 13, 2011 5:27 PM
Subject: Re: [iris-species] I. versicolor

 

There is a description of Gaspe study on wikipedia:


R

From: Chuck Chapman <i*@aim.com>
To: i*@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Saturday, October 8, 2011 8:15 PM
Subject: Re: [iris-species] I. versicolor

 
I read Anderson's articles.

He viewed setosa canadesis as a glaciation relic, with very limited variation as a result of only a few individuals surviving. It has no branching, and was short, so by his reasoning couldn't be one of parents of versicolour. At time of doing his research there was only one artic setosa. After looking at specimens in  herberiums he felt that there had to be another setosa with better branching and height to account for morphology of versicolor.

He checked glaciation data and found a valley in Alaska that was free of ice during last glaciation period. In this location was found a setoa was taller and had better branching then coastal alaska setosa. This was classified as ssp interior based on Anderson's research and information. And by reasoning more ancestral then canadesis and coastal Alaska setosa. And fit needed morphology needed for ancestral setosa for versicolor.

The morphological data collected in Gaspe was to study math models of species discrimination. This was done with statistician Fisher analyzing the data. This study was very influential.  Quoted all over the place. A separate study.

Chuck Chapman

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Pries <robertpries@embarqmail.com>
To: iris-species <iris-species@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Sat, Oct 8, 2011 7:38 am
Subject: Re: [iris-species] I. versicolor

 
I find the discussion very interesting. I will not have a chance to do any research on this until Monday. I hope we can continue the discussion then. I am stubborn and not yet convinced. Since Hookeri was known to Anderson as a separate species one would have thought he would have said that if that is what he meant. But at the moment all of this is second hand information including what I remember from a paper I read 20 years ago. Chuck makes an interesting point about location. But it could be used to back up my argument also. I am enjpying the discussion and I think it informs all of us. If I find information contrary to my belief I will share that also.

From: "Chuck Chapman" <i*@aim.com>
To: i*@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Friday, October 7, 2011 11:48:00 PM
Subject: Re: [iris-species]  I. versicolor

 
Found a reference to Anderson's morphological study, quote as follows.

"In reality, biologist Edgar Anderson took these iris
measurements in the late 1920's on the Gaspà Peninsula in Quebec, Canada."

So comparison was to hookeri, even if he said attributed parent of versicolor as  ssp interior in other articles.

Chuck Chapman

-----Original Message-----
From: Robert Pries <r*@embarqmail.com>
To: iris-species <i*@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Fri, Oct 7, 2011 9:27 pm
Subject: Re: [iris-species] I. versicolor

 
I checked out the Flora of North America and I do believe Norlan got it wrong when he attributed Anderson as saying hookeri. I am fairly certain Anderson talked about Iris interior not hookeri as a parent. I do know there are other disputes with the Flora of North Americas treatment of Irises.

From: "Sean A. Zera" <z*@umich.edu>
To: i*@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Friday, October 7, 2011 5:22:19 PM
Subject: Re: [iris-species]  I. versicolor

 
Apparently I can't trust the Flora of North America at efloras.org,
which states "E. Anderson (1936) showed rather conclusively that Iris
versicolor arose as an amphidiploid between I. virginica (n = 35) and
I. hookeri (I. setosa var. canadensis) (n = 19)." Needless to say,
though, I wasn't just making that up.

Having just checked the reference, Anderson actually described var.
interior because only plants from that region of Alaska fit his
careful morphological predictions of what the setosa parent of
versicolor should look like.

Anderson points out that allopolyploidy explains why there are no
albino versicolors. I. virginica is already an ancient tetraploid, so
in order to be albino both sets of chromosomes must possess the
mutation. It's even worse for versicolor, which has three sets of
ancestral chromosomes.

Sean Z

Quoting Robert Pries <r*@embarqmail.com>:

> Iris virginica is not a hybrid. It is a species of hybrid origin.
> That origi n is believed to have occured ten thousand years ago
> during the last ice age. The parent was not hookeri but Iris se tosa
> interior whose range was pushed south by the ice sheet. The
> researcher who i nvestigated this was Edgar Anderson director of the
> Missouri Botanical Gardens and most of his papers on this are found
> published in the Missouri Botanical Gardens A nnals. Anderson was a
> great friend of the Iris Society and h ad an iris test garden at
> MoBot. He was also the author of Iris xrobusta which IS a hybrid as
> denoted by the x in its name. R obusta is a fairly commonly grown
> plant with several selected cultivars, Gerald Darby being one of the
> best known. Nature is constantly evolving but generally species are
> no longer considered hybrids after having found a niuche in the
> natural world for thousands of years. Many Irises like the Pacific
> Coast Natives are still in the process of speciation. Some authors
> would say that all the more or less 10 species of PCN are all one
> species that is constantly separating and coming together. O thers
> sort out the 10 species and note that perhaps as many plants growing
> in this region are hybrids as there are pure species. N ature does
> not have semantics that is a human invention.   
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sean A. Zera" <z*@umich.edu>
> To: i*@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Thursday, October 6, 2011 9:51:50 AM
> Subject: Re: [iris-species]  I. versicolor 'Murrayana'
>
>  
>
>
>
>
> I believe the current assumption is that versicolor is a hybrid
> between virginica and hookeri (a.k.a. setosa v. canadensis). Not
> counting hookeri, the nearest setosa is in southern Alaska, thousands
> of miles away from versicolor or virginica.
>
> Since virginica and versicolor (and probably Ãrobusta) are mixed up or
> simply not distinguished in the nursery trade, and are planted in
> large numbers in wetland mitigations and restorations, I'd be
> surprised if there aren't lots of populations established outside
> their original ranges.
>
> Sean Z
>
> Quoting Chuck Chapman < i*@aim.com >:
>
>> I just looked at article on Murrayana.
>>
>> Very interesting.
>>
>> A couple of observations. The offspring of Murrayana X vesicolor 
>> sound very much like offspring of crosses of virginica x versicolor 
>> Except that the "Robusta" plants are usually fertile.
>>
>> Also versicolor were produced from a natural cross of setosa x
>> virginica. And  hokerii is very closely related to setosa. Hookeri
>> and  versicolor are both native to Newfoundland.
>>
>> I found Cast Ashore (a robusta) in an area that has versicolor but
>> no virginica. so you can have  plant relics or  hybrid relics in
>> strange locations.
>>
>> Chuck Chapman
>>
>> Sometimes
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Eleanor Hutchison &lt; e*@mymts.net &gt;
>> To: iris-species &lt; i*@yahoogroups.com &gt;
>> Sent: Wed, Oct 5, 2011 10:31 pm
>> Subject: [iris-species] I. versicolor 'Murrayana'
>>
>>  
>> Todd, I rec'd this iris today, so looked up a bit more information
>> about it and came across your interesting article at Dave's Garden,
>> "The Story of Iris versicolor 'Murrayana'".
>>  
>> I hope I planted it at the correct depth, as it had roots heading
>> up one of the stems.
>>  
>> El, Ste Anne, Manitoba, Canada
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>



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