Talk:Neopanax colensoi

Requested move 6 October 2024

• Neopanax colensoi → Pseudopanax colensoi
• Neopanax laetus → Pseudopanax laetus

– WP:COMMONNAME and WP:FLORA - overwhelming usage within recent scientific papers, despite mixed use in taxonomic databases. Without a clear scientific basis for a preference of one name over the other, MOS:ENGVAR/MOS:TIES: that there is a clear consensus among New Zealand scientific sources for a clade of plants endemic to New Zealand.

• Neopanax and Pseudopanax together form a clade. Currently there are three morphological forms of the species within this clade - two are always described as Pseudopanax, while one (the more basal form) is sometimes described as Neopanax and sometimes Pseudopanax. page 52 of this thesis has a useful graph showing phylogenetic relationships within the group. Neopanax was synonymised with Pseudopanax in the 20th century, re-established as a genus in 2004, but the justification of this was disputed in 2009. The distinction appears to be one based on conventions rather than a clear scientific justification (i.e. less based on whether or not Neopanax is a distinct clade within Pseudopanax, and more based on whether it's justified to use a different name for this clade, or to continue to use the pre-2004 convention). This issue was previously discussed at WikiProject Plants.
• Different taxonomical databases use different preferred names. Pseudopanax is overwhelmingly used by New Zealand databases.
  • Pseudopanax preferred: NZ Flora, Biota of New Zealand, IUCN, iNaturalist, NZOR and NZTCS
  • Neopanax preferred: CoL, EoL, GBIF, IRMNG, NCBI, OTOL, POWO
• Recent scientific sources outside of taxonomic databases overwhelmingly prefer Pseudopanax. Looking at Post-2020 Google Scholar results for species within the Neopanax clade:

• Neopanax arboreus 6
• Neopanax colensoi 3
• Neopanax kermadecensis 0
• Neopanax laetus 0
• Neopanax macintyrei 1

• Pseudopanax arboreus 150
• Pseudopanax colensoi 29
• Pseudopanax kermadecensis 3
• Pseudopanax laetus 4
• Pseudopanax macintyrei 2

Prosperosity (talk) 00:57, 6 October 2024 (UTC) — Relisting. Reading Beans 08:05, 13 October 2024 (UTC) — Relisting. FOARP (talk) 14:44, 25 October 2024 (UTC)

I don't think we should be invoking commonname and engvar in regards to which scientific name to use. I don't see why mountain five finger shouldn't be the title in light of this disagreement over how to categorise it.

iNaturalist is not a reliable source also. Traumnovelle (talk) 07:42, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

de Lange et al in NZPCN say it's a mess because the combinations haven't been resolved for Neopanax and thus they retain in Pseudopanax until it's sorted out. This is the reason for the preference across the NZ databases quoted. Beeswaxcandle (talk) 09:20, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

• Oppose both. Plants of the World Online uses Neopanax for both. YorkshireExpat (talk) 20:03, 6 October 2024 (UTC)

  @YorkshireExpat: What are your thoughts on Plants of the World Online breaking with common usage, as per the main principle of WP:FLORA? Either genus name has claim to being the valid scientific name, but one form is overwhelmingly used in modern scientific research. Prosperosity (talk) 05:24, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

  PoWO is generally the database we use (not for everything, ferns for example), and we don't use junior synonyms as article titles (long standing but not in policy, and sensible I think). I think if you're arguing with WP: COMMONNAME and MOS:TIES I'd be more inclined to support a move to 'mountain fivefinger'. YorkshireExpat (talk) 05:58, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

  @YorkshireExpat: The issue here is neither Neopanax arboreus or Pseudopanax arboreus is a junior synonym. NZ databases for an NZ endemic plant treat Neopanax arboreus as a synonym, while PoWO treats Pseudopanax arboreus as a synonym. "Mountain fivefinger" seems to be a very uncommon name for the plant, so I'm not fully convinced that's the best option. Prosperosity (talk) 06:12, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

  I still don't think it's valid to argue WP:COMMONNAME or MOS:TIES for scientific names. Scientific names are global labels species that remove ambiguity. They aren't tied to a particular country. PoWO is a global authority, and I think we should follow that. YorkshireExpat (talk) 08:53, 7 October 2024 (UTC)

  @YorkshireExpat: (sorry for the late reply) So from my perspective, there's a current consensus among scientific publications, and PoWO contradicts this. I feel that deferring to PoWO as a global authority, while ignoring what name is used in scientific publications, does not follow the principles of WP:FLORA. Prosperosity (talk) 02:18, 15 October 2024 (UTC)

• I'm inclined to support this - while I'm sympathetic to the argument to use a single database, we don't use this database for everything (as mentioned already) and so it's clearly not a hard and fast rule that we must follow. Further to this, the analysis of sources shows overwhelming usage of Pseudopanax over Neopanax in relation to these species is a strong argument in favour of the move. I also note that other species which have variously been described as falling into either genus seem to already be at Pseudopanax, so consistency would also suggest a move is in order. Given there are also a range of databases which use Pseudopanax for these species, the new name would still align with usage in databases (but better align with scientific usage), so I'm not fussed about that side of things. Turnagra (talk) 18:08, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Weak support: Per Turnagra. --Spekkios (talk) 20:08, 30 October 2024 (UTC)