Glossary Available

I have developed a glossary of English common names to botanical names for (currently) 149 species possibly used for bonsai. Botanical names are based on current taxonomic authorities. The original file is in FileMaker Pro. I can send it in PDF. This is not a copyright document. Consider using this for your show labels. Anyone wants a copy, just send me your e-mail address. Since it is updated periodically, you will need to stay in touch to get updates.
Iris

Thanks Iris!

This would be very helpful for most people. I'll PM my email address to you.


regards,
jun

Hi Iris,

This could be done as an inserted table with BBcode. Use the button in the editor, just before "Host an image" :

The administrators know about this glossary, but haven't yet gotten around to incorporating it. It is much too long to insert in one of the forums. The printout runs five pages.
It is in FileMaker because that is our family's pet database. It works across Mac & PC. It would be very burdensome for me to transfer it to Excel or anything else. It is much simpler to run off a new PDF.
It may be regional, but in the Northeast we grade or mark papers interchangeably.
I am painfully aware that I am in what some consider a remote colony.
I try to look up some of the exotic species from far away.
Iris

Five pages !

I hadn't thought of that...

OK, I'll PM you to get the PDF then

Thanks Iris, i sent you my email address,look forward to seeing this file, Cheers Mike.

Got it.. Thanks very much Iris, it looks good and is well layed out and printable. Thanks again. Mike

Well worth getting. Thanks, Iris.

For those living in sub-tropical climates:

A member of a French forum is starting a thread on the trees that they find in Guadeloupe (French Antilles), it might be an interesting source of info for some unusual species such as the first one he's describing there, Conocarpus erecta:

http://www.espritsdegoshin.fr/forum-bonsai/topic.html?id=10820#p166425

Thanks. The French is a little over my head, but I got the gist of it. Interesting that several languages call the buttonwood a mangrove, but actually it grows a little bit inland from the true mangrove habitat, as I understand it.
Iris

Hi again Iris,

And thanks for sharing : I got your files all right

You didn't answer my private message about converting your .pdf file to a free (GNU-GPL) format, but i hope you won't mind my taking your work as a start to a wider project.

I personally use "LibreOffice", that's what they are going to use in my school to, which is rather ironical : there have been funding cuts because europe is not, as I used to think poor me when I was a teen, a "community" (Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, and for those who have ever opened a book at the chapter "European History", that really means something...) , it's just a system to get the fat cats get fatter.

Anyway.

I'm asking again, here : do you accept thet your work should be the basis of a common, international project ?

We all look for info about the trees we cultivate (e.g. "bougainvillée" ) but sometimes, the best information in in a foreign langauage. creating a document which is only accesible via American English is a limit to what I think is a basic human need : sharing knowledge.

OK, call me a communist

Maybe you can edit the PDF files and add the French common names?????????

Dunno how many languages we'd want to have before it got too cumbersome.

JimLewis wrote:Maybe you can edit the PDF files and add the French common names?????????

Yes, and that's what I've started to do.

JimLewis wrote:Dunno how many languages we'd want to have before it got too cumbersome.

Well, you can convert it to .txt format, then to .odt or .ods format thanks to LibreOffice.

LibreOffice enables you to read, edit and save documents that are otherwise restricted to a "proprietary software".

I have made a "free" GNU-GPL, Creative Commons version of Iris's file. No need to buy (actually, people just "upgrade", that is continue to pay for software they don't need but were implanted in the compûter they bought.

They've paid when they bought the computer, they're still paying when a new version of those proprietary softwares, finally discover they suck and they have to update fast or everyone's busted, for "small fee" .

For what makes people know more should not be the property of a few capitalists who prefer manipulation and ignorance, knowledge must be widely distributed all around the world, so that people finally live in peace.

No master, no god, no היים
.
.
.

It has already been established at law in the US that a list, like a telephone directory, can't be copyright. There is a lot of dispute over certain databases, like award lists, but I don't consider my glossary proprietary property. However, it gets updated periodically. I have a list of people I have sent it to, so you will be getting a new edition one of these days. Of course it will be nice if I get credit for it. Just don't change any names without consulting me.
Iris

bonsaisr wrote:It has already been established at law in the US that a list, like a telephone directory, can't be copyright.

That's good news!

It seems pretty obvious, but even here, the legal system is evolving : even the air we breathe will soon be copyright if it goes on like that (a lot of profit for a happy few, and the meek shall inherit... the sh***)

bonsaisr wrote: (...) Of course it will be nice if I get credit for it. Just don't change any names without consulting me.
Iris

Of course you will be credited for it.

By default, all that I publish online is BY-NC-SA. See this link :

Creative Commons

Quote :

Science

We believe that scientific research, journals, and data should be available to everyone, and have legal tools that help make this happen.

That's also why I prefer using free GNU-GPL software.

Some of the kids I teach don't even have a computer at home. And my school has finally tuned to what seems common sense to me : all the documents will now be in LibreOffice format next year. We just couldn't afford buying Micro$oft licences for all the computers (most of them outdated by the way, public spending cuts as the "global" economic religion goes nowadays, ask the Greeks...)

How could I publish anything for anyone looking for knowledge that would require a paying software ?

I haven't had time to complete all the French names in the list, but here's where you can get the first draft. I've made a few additions to your list, I've noted them "AK - date" in column A :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/67stvj

It's in .ods format



OK, for those who can't help paying, or most of the time, pirating, LibreOffice can convert files to other formats, which Micro$oft can't :

csv :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/asw68l

xls :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/mozt04

xslx :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/ehd66p

xlt :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/8zygu0

pdf :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/v8degu

sxc :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/pbkug0

html :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/21p7dp

Well, the .html file is not bad at all;: i had never used this conversion before, but it really looks nifty.

The file can be exported as a databse too with LibreOffice :

http://www.sendspace.com/file/r9vv66

Well, well, well, a lot of interoperabilty, isn't it?

I've also added a couple of Chinese names I found on Wikipedia just for fun at first, but it might help if one wants to find pics of species in their local environment.
See for instance the link I found on "Ginkgo biloba" : the bonsai that are displayed on that page are not in the "Japanese" style, i.e. the "flame" style, but look much more natural to me.

Alain

In my copy of the glossary, I added Ostrya carpinifolia, Hop Hornbeam.

Very similar to Ostrya virginiana, American Hop Hornbeam. This species is widely distributed in "Italy, France, Austria, Slovenia, Greece, the Balkans, southern Switzerland and Anatolia" (Wikipedia).

Some examples there :

Ostrya from Croatia

And: Oriental hornbeam (Carpinus orientalis), there are some very nice specimens from about the same geographic area.

Also added these ones, that are frequently used in Europe:

Carpinus betulus, European / common hornbeam

Cedrus Atlantica, Cèdre de l'Atlas

For a lot of species, I've just put "id." because we either don't have a vernacular name for cultivars like "Arakawa" for instance, or I don't know if there is another name than the botaniocal name for species that are not planted or don't grow here, e.g. "Chloroleucon tortum", the Brazilian rain tree.

Note also that the "Fukien tea" is very rarely called "Ehretia microphylla" , the accepted botanical name is now "Carmona retusa" but in France, most people continue to call it "Carmona microphylla". A bit confusing, i admit.

I've only done half the translation, I will send Iris the file when I've completed it.

From the Plant List:
<<Carmona retusa (Vahl) Masam. is a synonym of Ehretia microphylla Lam.
This name is a synonym of Ehretia microphylla Lam..>>
The accepted name is Ehretia microphylla.
Iris

Hi Iris,

Here are my sources:

United States Department of Agriculture :

Taxon: Ehretia microphylla Lam.
Synonym of Carmona retusa (Vahl) Masam.
Genus: Ehretia
Family: Boraginaceae.

And:

Taxon: Carmona retusa (Vahl) Masam.
Genus: Carmona
Family: Boraginaceae subfamily: Boraginoideae.

(Germplasm Resources Information Network)
(GRIN)
(emoticon for "GRIN, I suppose ) Joking apart, this has always seemed to be the official reference in the US, and they list "Ehretia microphylla" as a synonym for what looks like the official name, but maybe I'm wrong. What's the reference to the "plant list" you're mentioning? Most of the time, I rely on:

Wikipedia :

Carmona retusa
Flower, fruit and leaf
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Plantae
(unranked): Angiosperms
(unranked): Eudicots
(unranked): Asterids
Order: (unplaced)
Family: Boraginaceae
Subfamily: Boraginoideae
Genus: Carmona
Species: C. retusa
Binomial name
Carmona retusa
(Vahl) Masam.[1]

Synonyms

Cordia retusa Vahl
Ehretia microphylla Lam.
Carmona microphylla (Lam.) G.Don
Ehretia buxifolia Roxb.

Also, this article dated January, 2003 by the "Biological resources Division - Haleakala field Station, Maui, Hawai'i" is about "Carmona retusa" as the species and refers to "Ehretia Microphylla" as a synonym :

Carmona retusa

Anyway, taxonomy is evolving, but the names given in nurseries or even in reference article don't always follow at the same pace. Ask anyone in France what "Larix × marschlinsii" is, apart from me and a few larch fans who've read my posts on French forums, no one will know. A few more know about "Larix eurolepis", but they're still to be counted on Django Rheinhardt's left hand as I like to say

I'll keep working on it, I find taxonomy addictive

I've found the link to "the plant List" !

http://www.theplantlist.org/

I must admit I didn't know this source, and they say :

Carmona retusa (Vahl) Masam. is a synonym of Ehretia microphylla Lam.
This name is a synonym of Ehretia microphylla Lam..

So GRIN must be wrong, and so was I...

If Kew gardens and Missouri Botanical Garden agree on that, there's nothing more to be said

Don't change your label yet. Even the Plant List is sometimes wrong. This dispute has been going on for some time. What floored me is that Cordia retusa (the basionym) was published in 1791, and Ehretia microphylla in 1792. I e-mailed my mentor, Rafael Govaerts, editor of the Kew Checklist, to see what he knows about this. I am awaiting an answer.
Be careful of addiction to taxonomy. By the time you are 82, you could be as insufferable as I am.
Iris

bonsaisr wrote:
Be careful of addiction to taxonomy. By the time you are 82, you could be as insufferable as I am.
Iris

OMG!

... I'm already insufferable!

By the way, I've just sent you an xls file containing a few additions.

This just in:
Ehretia microphylla is correct.
Few people now accept the genus Carmona, but if you do the name Carmona retusa is correct in that genus (the epithet retusa is earlier but already occupied for another species in Ehretia).
That is the LAST WORD.
Iris

I have just completed a new update, & I am preparing a permanent e-mail list of victims.
Jun and Hilton Meyer, please send me your e-mail addresses again as I am not certain I have them.

JimLewis wrote:Maybe you can edit the PDF files and add the French common names?

Anyone who has Adobe Acrobat can edit a PDF.
IMPORTANT
We had a big computer meltdown recently, and I am missing many files since 2009. If you are on my mailing list for the glossary, or you want to be, please let me know. I keep it at 175 species. Also, if you have a recent glossary, kindly send it to me. I have to send an update soon. There is mischief afoot among the acacias.
Iris

I am about to send out an updated glossary. I am missing some addresses. I need Jun and Hilton Meyer, also Kev & Fiona, if you are still interested.
I have to admit the list is heavily weighted toward species grown for bonsai in North America, because that is where most of the people are who use the glossary. We'll see who gets added to the mailing list.
Iris