Misplaced Pages

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This guideline documents an English Misplaced Pages naming convention. Editors should generally follow it, though exceptions may apply. Substantive edits to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on this guideline's talk page.

Shortcut WP:NC(flora)

Policy page Misplaced Pages: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 naming of flora articles has special difficulties, but is in general compatible with naming policy and the standard Tree of Life project.

Common names for species which are unambiguous enough for Misplaced Pages are rare in botany: many species bear several English names, and some English names are applied to different unrelated species. The first case have no true common name; the second should use scientific names for the various species in the interest of sufficient precision. Common names for species should be used chiefly in the following cases, and never when they imply a point of view:

1. Agricultural and horticultural cases in which multiple different products stem from the same scientific name (eg. brussels sprouts, cabbage & broccoli). In such a case, a separate page with the botanical description of the entire species is preferred (eg. Brassica oleracea).
2. Plants that are sufficiently significant economically or culturally should be given a page describing their use, history and associations, with their common name as a page title. Example: coffee. Simultaneously, a separate page titled with the plant's scientific name should be created; this would be the place for botanical descriptions and relationships. Example: Coffea.
3. Where a genus is monospecific (has only a single species), the article should be named after the genus, with the species name as a redirect. If a family contains only one genus, the article should still be at the genus name, as that is more likely to be commonly recognised.

Common species names will normally be redirects to an article under the scientific name, or disambiguation pages between the various species bearing that name:

• English sundew → Drosera anglica
• Ironwood

All known current English common names for a taxon should be listed in the plant article, and every such name should have a redirect or a disambiguation page leading to the article.

• Hesperoyucca whipplei (Our Lord's Candle, Spanish Bayonet, Quixote Yucca, Common Yucca; syn. Yucca whipplei) is a species of flowering plant...

An English name should be used as the common name for the article on a taxon if it is the only prominent name for the taxon in English (spelling variations excepted), is unambiguous as the name of a plant (e.g., the secondary meanings of Poison ivy do not prevent its usage for Toxicodendron radicans), and is widely attested in reliable secondary sources (without the scientific name) as meaning the entire taxon. Common names for genera and higher taxa may be more common; thus we use Maple, not Acer (genus).

Where the boundaries of the common noun are vague (e.g. grass), separate articles on the common noun and the taxon (Poaceae) may be helpful; this will often come under exception 2 above. It may be desirable to call groups which are not taxa by a common name where one exists, especially in preference to an ambiguous and obsolete taxonomic name (e.g. Dicotyledon; the obsolete classification Magnoliopsida had several meanings in different systems.)

See also

• Tree of Life naming convention
• Plant naming convention discussion

• Misplaced Pages naming conventions