HYBRID CHARTS |
This shows the hybrid charts of families of plants. [The hybrid charts themselves are embedded within the Family Album pages, but that is of no concern]. For added convenience, those Family Album pages which have hybrid charts (not all of them do because some Families do not appear to have hybrids found in the wild) are all listed individually here.
For a plant to be a hybrid it must have an '×' between the genus name and the specific epithet. If that is missing, for example in
The hybrid chart, example above, takes the form of a n × n square array, where the possible parents are both listed on the two grey axes, x-axis and y-axis. If a hybrid between two parents on the x- and y-axes exists, then the corresponding square within the body of the chart is highlighted brown. Those squares without hybrids are in a darker brown. The black squares are on the diagonal show and merely show that hybrids cannot exist between two identical parents. Note that the diagram is symmetrical and that each hybrid appears twice, on either side of the black diagonal.
Where the hybrids have (English) names then these are shown in preference to the latin name, which will be of the form : Genus name × second name
In the (active) example above, clicking on non-empty squares results in the popping out of external pages from the BSBI (Botanical Society of the British Isles) website. Clicking on either a parent or a hybrid will result in a BSBI map of the distribution of the plant so called, where you will also see further details purporting to its name.
NOT represented on these charts are any inter-Genus hybrids, hybrids between one genus and another, normally shown as such: X A. bbbbb × B. ddddd.
On the other hand, clicking on the key square (top left) will result in a list of ALL species with that first name, regardless of whether they hybridise. This is extremely useful in seeing all the possible species belonging to that particular sub-group, many of which will not yet be listed in this, the Wild Flower Finder website.
The chart is followed by a list of species belonging to the same Genus for which no known hybrids exist (or, more likely, do not exist in the UK). Knowing which species are without hybrids is almost as important as knowing which species have hybrids, for then identification may be much easier. Hybrids complicate identification, especially continuous-spectrum hybrids.
Occasionally there are hybrids between Genera, which cannot be shown properly on the Hybrid Charts, but, as in the above example, an attempt is made to display these whenever there are any. In the above chart the inter-genus hybrid between an Anacamptis species and a Gymnadenia species is shown on the 'forbidden' diagonal in green where in reality a 3-D 3-axis table is required (but you are not going to get one just for this one inter-genera hybrid). An inter-genera hybrid might be an indication that the taxonomy of these two genera is in need of slight adjustment.
All the Hybrid Charts are derived from the species list from the BSBI, with corrections to any spelling errors by the Author. [Any spelling errors or omissions by the BSBI prevent the Authors' program, which converts a linear list into a hybrid chart, from properly identifying hybrids. These errors have had to be corrected by the Author who has referred to 'The New Flora of the British Isles' by Clive Stace for further guidance. The sub-species and variations (subsp. and var.) are automatically shown in the list of Species Lacking Hybrids, but they may well be involved in hybrids if the same species is. The same may apply to entries including terms such as 'agg.' (aggregate) or 's.l' or 'sens. lat', etc.
TRIPLE AND QUADRUPLE HYBRIDS
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