Talk:Salix × fragilis

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Facts for this article were taken from [1]. The previous version gave completely different data and is probably a joke. Andris 20:03, May 17, 2004 (UTC)

Salix fr. bullata

In Finland I see lots of Salix fragilis bullata - any info about those. I am sure about the names as Some of them were freshly planted with their labels still on. Ensonic (talk) 16:43, 29 August 2008 (UTC)

While reminding myself of the nomenclatural status of the name Salix fragilis I found a statement that 'Bullata' is a clone of Salix euxina. Lavateraguy (talk) 12:52, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

Requested move 23 July 2021

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved per request. Favonian (talk) 15:56, 31 July 2021 (UTC)

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Salix fragilis → Salix euxina – The name Salix fragilis is obsolete and other Wikipedia articles are already reflecting this (e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salix_babylonica#Horticultural_selections_and_related_hybrids). Salix × fragilis is the name for what used to be (now a synonym) S. × rubens, that means the hybrid between Salix euxina and Salix alba. See https://www.jstor.org/stable/27757021 Please note that the proposal for nomen conservandum Salix fragilis auct. did not pass in 2005. Vladimír Fuka (talk) 14:14, 23 July 2021 (UTC)

Seems pretty uncontroversial to me; Kew agrees on this usage [2]. --Elmidae (talk · contribs) 15:38, 24 July 2021 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This would need some cleanup of the text after the move. But POWO accepts Salix ×fragilis (syn Salix ×rubens). I suspect that this has been moved to the wrong place - while the species has been renamed as Salix euxina, that may not have been the subject of the article. Lavateraguy (talk) 12:12, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

To the degree that the subject is identifiable the article is about Salix ×fragilis. See this. Lavateraguy (talk) 12:39, 6 August 2021 (UTC)

The move was wrong. Sources, and the article section referred to (Salix babylonica#Horticultural selections and related hybrids) are clear that Salix × fragilis and Salix euxina are distinct, and this article is supposed to be about the former. I will move the article to Salix × fragilis and clean it up a bit. Peter coxhead (talk) 05:49, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

I've made the move and created a stub at Salix euxina. Some more work is needed. Peter coxhead (talk) 06:22, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

Now expanded. The taxonomy is ok, but the description still needs some work, because older sources may be describing either this species or S. euxina. Peter coxhead (talk) 17:53, 7 August 2021 (UTC)

I am not so sure about that, the name that used to be applied to the hybrid used to be Salix rubens. Salix fragilis was really always commonly used for the pure species that is now named Salix euxina. The renaming of the taxons made a lot of confusion because it was thought that L. described the pure species. Indeed, you will commonly find the common name "brittle willow" together with the name Salix euxina. The species was previously undescribed (legally, because people thought it was described by L.) but not unknown. The hybrid nature of many specimens was well understood and the hybrid was well-known and named Salix rubens. Only later it was find out that L. actually used the name Salix fragilis to what was commonly known as Salix rubens and hence he has the priority and Salix rubens has to be renamed to Salix fragilis. Vladimír Fuka (talk) 11:07, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

My understanding is the Salix x rubens was named from the backcross with Salix alba, and that most of the plants outside the native range of Salix euxina are the hybrid; the problem was not just that people thought that Linneaus described the full species, but also that the line between the species and the hybrid was drawn in the wrong place. The 3rd edition of Stace says that 3 out of the 4 varieties of Salix fragilis, including the type, are the hybrid. Lavateraguy (talk) 16:28, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

@Lejzy: the problem was not that many botanists weren't aware that there was a pure species and a hybrid, but, as Belyaeva discovered, was that many herbarium specimens, including those underlying Flora Europaea, were a mixture of the pure species and the hybrid – mostly the latter – with the result that many descriptions were confused/confusing. This confusion is independent of which name was or should be used for each.

@Peter coxhead: Thank you for the more detailed explanation. I think some of the explanations I read (and the now available descriptions for our local flora) were a bit simplified. I would like just want to stress that S. euxina is not limited to the Black sea as might appear to some. The selected specimens in Belyayva 2009 are from all over Central and Western Europe - including the British Isles (but not Scandinavia).Vladimír Fuka (talk) 12:38, 10 August 2021 (UTC)

The taxonomy section could be expanded to discuss the decision not to conserve Salix fragilis for the pure species, but to accept a newly designated lectotype which was clearly the hybrid. It's a matter of judgement as to how far very technical taxonomic issues like this should be explained in Wikipedia; I have been criticized in the past for going into too much taxonomic detail. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:58, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

@Lavateraguy: I've put Stace's view on var. decipiens not being the hybrid in the article, but it contradicts Belyaeva and PoWO. I wonder what his source is, or whether it's his personal view. Peter coxhead (talk) 19:58, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

He had the same position in the 3rd edition (2010), which may have been written before Belyaeva published. It is conceivable that var. decipiens auct. Brit. is not the same as var. decipiens W.D.J.Koch. (There's a paper in the last issue of British and Irish Botany which says that there's been inconsistent application of variety names in Betula pubescens.) Sell & Murrell follow Belyaeva. They also write "Continental authors believed what British authors called var. decipiens was typical Salix fragilis. British authors believed that the typical Salix fragilis was a different plant based on John Ray's Salix folio longo latoque splendente, fragilis ... cited by Linnaeus." This is at least consistent with a difference of application, as is giving Salix fragilis auct. and Salix decipiens auct. as the synonymy of Salix euxina, and consequently rejecting var. decipiens as a distinct taxon. I would have hoped that Belyaeva addressed this point. Sell & Murrell also add vars. rubens and basfordiana.

Sell & Murrell give Salix euxina as the parent of several hybrids; one wonders whether the parentage of "fragilis hybrids" has been fully disentangled. Lavateraguy (talk) 21:43, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

Broken link - may not be correct

The link to http://www.na.fs.fed.us/fhp/invasive_plants/weeds/crack-willow.pdf title 'USFS—United States Forest Service: Salix fragilis — "Weed of the Week"' is broken, although the ref is used repeated. There's a copy at archive.org, but I'm not sure that it's about the right species. It says that it forms hybrids with Salix alba, has leaves which are "pale to white-hairless below", and grows readily from seed. This fits much better with Belyaeva's description of Salix euxina.

@Lavateraguy: as you've looked at this article, do you have a view? Peter coxhead (talk) 09:26, 9 August 2021 (UTC)

archive.org is timing out. One would expect that taxon in North America to be the hybrid, and forming hybrids with Salix alba could be a reference to Salix x rubens. But in the absence of access to the document one doesn't know where they sourced their information from. Lavateraguy (talk) 16:45, 9 August 2021 (UTC)