Aureolaria virginica

Aureolaria virginica, the downy yellow false foxglove or downy oak leach, is a perennial forb native to the eastern United States and Canada,[3] which produces yellow flowers in summer.

Aureolaria virginica
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Plantae
Clade: Tracheophytes
Clade: Angiosperms
Clade: Eudicots
Clade: Asterids
Order: Lamiales
Family: Orobanchaceae
Genus: Aureolaria
Species:
A. virginica
Binomial name
Aureolaria virginica
Synonyms

Agalinis glauca (Eddy) S.F.Blake
Agalinis virginica (L.) S.F.Blake
Aureolaria dispersa (Small) Pennell
Aureolaria glauca Raf.
Aureolaria microcarpa Pennell
Dasistoma dispersa Small
Dasistoma quercifolia (Pursh) Benth.
Dasistoma virginica Britton
Gerardia dispersa (Small) K. Schum.
Gerardia glauca Eddy
Gerardia quercifolia Pursh
Rhinanthus virginicus L.
Agalinis flava (L.) B.Boivin
Aureolaria calycosa (Mack. & Bush) Pennell
Aureolaria reticulata Raf.
Aureolaria villosa Raf.
Dasistoma aurea Raf.
Dasistoma calycosa Mack. & Bush
Dasistoma flava (L.) Alph.Wood
Dasistoma pubescens Benth.
Gerardia calycosa (Mack. & Bush) Fernald
Gerardia flava L.
Gerardia villosa Muhl. ex Raf. [1][2]

Description

Botanical illustration of Dasystoma flava (1913)

Aureolaria virginica is 50 to 150 centimeters tall and covered in fine downy hairs. The leaves are ovate to lanceolate, 6 to 15 centimeters long and 1.5 to 4.5 centimeters wide. The lower leaves sometimes have lobes or teeth. The flowers are borne on 1 to 3 millimeter long pedicles. The flowers have five 3.5 to 4.5 centimeters long petals fused into a corolla tube, and are smooth on the outside. The fruit is a 1 to 1.5 centimeter long dry ovoid capsule that splits open when ripe.[4][5]

Distribution and habitat

Aureolaria virginica is widely distributed in the eastern United States, although local distribution may be spotty. It has been recorded in Alabama, Connecticut, Washington, D.C., Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Vermont, and West Virginia. It has also been recorded in the Canadian province of Ontario. Aureolaria virginica is listed as threatened in the state of New Hampshire.[3] In Virginia, it grows in dry oak dominated forests.[6] The presence of this species is dependent on appropriate habitat, and it may be eliminated from an area by development, changes in land use, or competition with invasive species.

Ecology

Like other members of the genus Aureolaria, this species is hemiparasitic on oaks. It may be limited to Quercus alba as a host.[7] It also possesses chlorophyll and performs photosynthesis.[4]

Taxonomy

This species is a member of the genus Aureolaria, which was formerly placed in the family Scrophulariaceae, but has more recently been placed in the family Orobanchaceae, in keeping with the findings of the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group.[8]

The species now known as Aureolaria virginica was first described by Carl Linnaeus in 1753, who named it Rhinanthus virginicus. The same year he was also the first to describe the species now known as Aureolaria flava, which he named Gerardia flava. In the 19th century, botanists renamed both species, which were now understood to belong to the same genus, several times, resulting in numerous synonyms. In the early 20th century Francis W. Pennell discovered that the downy species known at that time as Dasystoma flava actually matched the original description of Linnaeus' Rhinanthus virginicus, and the smooth species known then as Dasystoma virginica actually matched the original description of Linnaeus' Gerardia flava. Pennell realized that an error had been made by 19th century botanists such as Caspar Wistar Eddy and Frederick Traugott Pursh, and so in keeping with botanical naming conventions, he restored the specific epithets of the basionyms to the original species to which they had applied. In 1935, Pennell published "The Scrophulariaceae of Eastern Temperate North America", which uses the current names of these species, Aureolaria virginica, and Aureolaria flava, and explains how confusion arose between the two.[9] News about this correction spread quickly,[10] and there have not been any more recent changes made to the names of these species. Unfortunately, some resources, particularly those functioning as aggregators of large quantities of information, including materials which may be out of date, have perpetuated the confusion, such as a public domain botanical illustration of Dasystoma virginica from 1913[11] which was mislabeled as Aureolaria virginica on the USDA website,[12] and later uploaded to Wikipedia.

References

  1. "Aureolaria virginica (L.) Pennell - The Plant List". Retrieved January 26, 2014. The Plant List (2013). Version 1.1. Published on the Internet; http://www.theplantlist.org/
  2. "Aureolaria flava (L.) Farw. - The Plant List". Retrieved February 11, 2014. The Plant List (2013). Version 1.1. Published on the Internet; http://www.theplantlist.org/
  3. "Plants Profile for Aureolaria virginica (downy yellow false foxglove)". Retrieved January 26, 2014. USDA, NRCS. 2014. The PLANTS Database (http://plants.usda.gov)%5B%5D. National Plant Data Team, Greensboro, NC 27401-4901 USA.
  4. "Aureolaria virginica (downy yellow false foxglove): Go Botany". Retrieved January 26, 2014.
  5. "NameThatPlant.net: Aureolaria virginica". Retrieved February 11, 2014. Copyright © 2006-2014 JK Marlow. Native Plants of the Carolinas & Georgia. (http://www.namethatplant.net)
  6. "Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora | Aureolaria virginica (L.) Pennell". Retrieved January 25, 2014. Virginia Botanical Associates. (2014). Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora (http://www.vaplantatlas.org)%5B%5D. c/o Virginia Botanical Associates, Blacksburg.
  7. "Aureolaria - Michigan Flora". Retrieved February 11, 2014. MICHIGAN FLORA ONLINE. A. A. Reznicek, E. G. Voss, & B. S. Walters. February 2011. University of Michigan.(http://michiganflora.net)
  8. Angiosperm Phylogeny Group. 2003. An update of the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group classification for the orders and families of flowering plants: APG II. Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society 141:399-436., cited in Walter Fertig "Farewell to the Aceraceae: Changes in the Angiosperm Family Tree" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on July 20, 2011. Retrieved February 11, 2014. The University of Montana Herbarium Newsletter. (Spring 2011). University of Montana, Missoula, MT. http://herbarium.dbs.umt.edu Archived 2014-03-06 at the Wayback Machine
  9. Pennell, Francis W. (1935). The Scrophulariaceae of Eastern Temperate North America, The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, PA.
  10. "The Ohio Journal of Science", Volume 21. (November, 1920). Ohio State University Scientific Society, Columbus, Ohio.
  11. Britton, Nathaniel Lord & Brown, Addison (1913). An Illustrated Flora of the Northern United States, Canada and the British Possessions: From Newfoundland to the Parallel of the Southern Boundary of Virginia, and from the Atlantic Ocean Westward to the 102d Meridian, Volume 3., p. 208. Charles Scribner's Sons, New York.
  12. "Large image for Aureolaria virginica (downy yellow false foxglove)". Retrieved February 11, 2014. USDA, NRCS. 2014. The PLANTS Database (http://plants.usda.gov)%5B%5D. National Plant Data Team, Greensboro, NC 27401-4901 USA.
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