ICRA for the Commelinaceae family

Skip to: A new denomination class // The checklist // Cultivar registration // My research // Conclusions

I’ve been the International Cultivar Registration Authority (ICRA) for the Tradescantia genus since 2022. That role – appointed to me by the International Society for Horticultural Science (ISHS) – makes me responsible for keeping a checklist of the correct names for every cultivar in the genus, as well as letting people register names for their new cultivars.

This week I finalised the checklist entries for the last few Continental Group cultivars, which had been undescribed and invalidly-named for so long. Finishing that process is something of a milestone in the cultivar checklist. As far as I know, it now contains valid names and descriptions for every single cultivar that existed before I became ICRA. Now all that’s left is the neverending task of documenting new cultivars as they arise. The checklist will never be permanently complete, but it’s now about as settled and comprehensive as it can ever really be.

This milestone coincides with some other big news. The ISHS has just agreed to expand my ICRA scope to the entire Commelinaceae family. Previously I was only responsible for Tradescantia itself. I had “unofficially” registered a couple of Callisia cultviars when growers asked, because there was no other ICRA for them. But the main focus of my checklist research was always limited to the one genus. Now, it also covers Callisia, Commelina, Cyanotis, Geogenanthus, Gibasis, Murdannia, Tinantia, and all the rest of the 36 genera in the family. This change has implications for a few different things.

A new denomination class

In the cultivar naming rules, the “denomination class” is the botanical group of plants that names are recorded for. By default, it’s a genus. Until now, Tradescantia was its own denomination class, Callisia was another, Gibasis was another, and so on. Cultivars names always have to be unique within a denomination class, but they can be reused in different denomination classes. It would be okay for someone to register a Hibiscus ‘Violet Hill’, or even a Callisia ‘Violet Hill’, despite the fact there’s already a Tradescantia zebrina ‘Violet Hill’ in a different genus.

Now, the entire Commelinaceae family has become a single denomination class. A name in any Commelianceae genus can’t be reused in any other genus in the family – Callisia ‘Violet Hill’ would no longer be allowed. Because Commelinaceae can all look very similar (especially if they’re not flowering), this change should help avoid any confusion that would arise from having the same cultivar name repeated in different genera of the family. When registering a new name, it will still be easy to search the entire checklist to make sure it hasn’t been used before in the family.

All the other rules for choosing and determining correct names are exactly the same as before.

The checklist

I’m going to get to work on expanding the online checklist to include other genera. This is going to be a big job! I think there will be fewer cultivars in the rest of the family than there were in Tradescantia alone. But it’s still going to take a lot of research to compile everything.

Needless to say, this won’t happen instantly, and I can’t give a timescale of when it might be complete. Over the coming weeks and months (and years…?), you’ll see cultivars of other genera start to appear on the list. You can assume that anything published on the list is as accurate and correct as possible. But if you don’t see an entry that you think should be there, that probably just means I haven’t got to it yet.

Cultivar registration

I can now properly accept cultivar registrations from any genus in the Commelinaceae family. The registrations I’ve already accepted will also become official. This doesn’t have much impact in practise, but it means that I won’t need to give confusing disclaimers about “unofficial” registrations, because everything will be treated the same way.

My research

In the course of my work as Tradescantia ICRA so far, I’ve done a lot of research that wasn’t actually required for the job. ICRAs aren’t expected to collect the plants, establish names for unnamed cultivars, write descriptions from scratch, or do growing trials to compare similar plants. I do those things with Tradescantia because I’m interested, and because they help with my ICRA work even though they’re not obligatory. But the fundemantal job of ICRA is essentially one of recordkeeping – compiling all the information and names that other people have already published, and recording the new cultivars that people choose to register.

With my expanded ICRA scope, I probably won’t be able to do the same amount of extra research for the entire family. I’m sure I will do some, especially in the groups I’m particularly interested in. But it’s just not likely to be possible for me to grow every single cultivar in the whole family in order to precisely describe and compare them. And it’s unlikely that I’ll be able to keep completely on top of all the unofficial names and obscure unregistered forms that circulate with no identity, let alone describe them all and establish names myself.

That all means that if you want things in the rest of the family to be completely figured out and pinned down, I might need your help! If I can’t grow the plants myself, I’ll need to refer to descriptions and obesrvations from other growers. If I can’t look out for every facebook post coining a name for a new mutation, I’ll only find out if people tell me about them. And if I can’t go through the whole process to establish names for mystery plants, growers will have to register their own new cultivars to get them officially published.

Conclusions

I’m now the ICRA for all Commelinaceae. Which means I’ll be able to officially register cultivars in other genera, and I’ll start expanding the online checklist to include the rest of the family. If you’re registering a new cultivar, you’ll now need to make sure its name doesn’t clash with any other in the whole family. And this expanded scope might also mean that I can’t do quite as much “extracurricular” research as I have done for the Tradescantia genus. You can help by keeping your own records and sharing information with me.

I’ve been tentatively expecting to become ICRA for the whole family since before I first published the Tradescantia checklist in 2022. (If you’ve ever wondered why the URL for every cultivar starts with tra-, it’s because I always planned to have different prefixes for different genera!). I didn’t intentionally wait until I had finalised the Continental Group before making this change, but I’m glad that the timing has coincided. I’m excited to have hit one milestone, just in time to head for another. As always, if you have any questions or information for me, please get in touch!