Wikipedia:Naming conventions (flora)

Policy page Wikipedia:Naming conventions

The naming conventions that apply to flora have been extensively discussed and continue to be discussed on the WikiProject Plants talk page

Article title

The following notes are in general compatible with naming policy and the standard Tree of Life project. Our general guidance includes using the name most common in English.

One problem in this discussion is that common name has two meanings in this context:

• the name which is "frequent" or "broadly used", which general Wikipedia practice supports; and
• The "vernacular" name, which Wikipedia does not support unless it is also common in the other sense.

The word common should therefore be used with care when addressing such issues; in this guideline, "commonly used name" means "frequent" or "broadly used" (as described in WP:COMMON), and "vernacular name" is used to mean the English "common name" as used by botanists.

The ideal title for an article would be a unique, unambiguous, and well-known name for its subject. It is quite rare for the name of a plant to possess all three of these properties. The scientific name is unambiguous, but it is only unique if no common name exists for the plant, and it is often not well-known. Vernacular names are often well known, but are usually ambiguous; and (if the subject of the article is a taxon) they can't be unique, since every plant has a scientific name. Hence there are special difficulties with the naming of articles on plants that have common names.

The non-uniqueness of vernacular names stems from that fact that, if a plant taxon is well-known enough to have a vernacular name, it often has several. In such cases, none of them are likely to be broadly used; the scientific name may be. Ambiguity arises when a vernacular name is applied to multiple unrelated taxa, a common occurrence. When a vernacular name is ambiguous, the scientific name may be a better title in the interests of sufficient precision. These two cases account for the majority of plant taxa, so most plant taxon articles are best titled with their scientific names (with redirects or disambiguation entries from the common names).

However the vernacular name of a taxon should be used for the article title when

• it is the only prominent vernacular name for the taxon (spelling variations excepted);
• it is more common (i.e. more broadly used) than the scientific name;
• it is unambiguous as the name of a taxon, and;
• it is widely attested in reliable secondary sources (without its association to the scientific name) in reference to the entire taxon as commonly circumscribed.

Cases where these conditions are likely to be met include:

1. Widely known genera and higher rank taxa; e.g. Maple, not Acer (genus); some species also will qualify.
2. Plant taxa that are commonly named after a plant product of which they are the source; e.g. coffee, rice. So long as a single article treats both plant taxon and plant product, the article should be named after the product. Ideally, though, these articles should eventually be split, with the plant taxon article to be entitled with the scientific name; e.g. Coffea, Oryza sativa.
   • Note that this does not apply when multiple plant products stem from the same plant taxon; e.g. brussels sprouts, cabbage and broccoli. In such cases, a separate article on the plant taxon is necessary; e.g. Brassica oleracea.

Vernacular names should also be used for groups that are not taxonomically sound, even if they were previously thought to be. For example, the dicots are no longer recognised as a valid taxon, so it is inappropriate to address that group by a scientific name.

Where the boundaries of the vernacular name are vague (e.g. grass), separate articles on the vernacular name and the taxon (Poaceae) may be helpful.

When treating monotypic taxa, it is often appropriate to treat the various ranks in a single article. If an article treats both a monospecific genus and its species, the article should be named after the genus, with the species name as a redirect. If an article treats both a monogeneric family and its genus, the article should still be at the genus name, as that is more likely to be commonly recognised.

See also

• General naming policy
• Tree of Life naming convention
• Guideline on common names
• Guideline on precision.
• Plant naming convention discussion
• How to use search engines intelligently and when not to rely on them.