Monday 27 October 2014

A new species of Tulip from Anhui Province in eastern China.

Tulips of the genus Amana are found in eastern Asia. They are very similar to the Tulips of Western Asia and Europe, which are placed in the genus Tulipa, differing only in the presence of bracts on the upper part of the flowering stem, and not all botanists have recognised the two genera as distinct. However modern genetic studies appear to support the separation of the two groups, as closely related but distinct genera with different geographical ranges.

In a paper published in the journal Phytotaxa on 27 August 2014, Bangxing Han of the Research Center of Research and Development of Traditional Chinese Medicine at West Anhui University and the National Resource Center for Chinese Materia Medica at the China Academy of Chinese Medical Science, Ke Zhang of the Department of Pharmacy at Anhui University of Chinese Medicine and Luqi Huang, also of the National Resource Center for Chinese MateriaMedica at the China Academy of Chinese Medical Science, describe a new species of Tulip from Ningguo County in Anhui Province, eastern China.

The new species is named Amana wanzhensis, meaning ‘from Wanzh’, though no explanation of this is given. It is a 15-30 cm high perennial herb growing from 1.5-2.5 cm bulbs, producing white flowers with brown stripes and green bases in February and March. It is widespread around the town of Xianxia, where it grows in moist Bamboo forests and meadows, at altitudes of 600-800 m above sea-level.

Amana wanzhensis.Yun-Xi Zhu in Han et al. (2014).

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