HICKORIES 165 



tinctive names. Carya aquatica being called "water 

 hickory" and Carya texana being called "bitter pe- 

 can/' By anchoring fixed points in nomenclature in 

 this way we may ride out the confusion which would 

 otherwise become worse confounded as the interest 

 in hickories becomes rapidly enlarged, if committees 

 on nomenclature do not take some decisive step in 

 the matter. 



Concerning Latin nomenclature we have further 

 troubles for settlement. Hicoria is the older generic 

 name and naturally should have priority but the 

 Vienna Congress of Botanists adopted Carya. So 

 far so good (or bad). Now comes our trouble in 

 giving specific and varietal names. The binomial is 

 clearly applicable enough for species, Carya pecan, 

 for example, but when we come to varieties of the 

 pecan there are two kinds of varieties to be consid- 

 ered, those by natural variation and those by hybridi- 

 zation. In cases of natural variation we are within 

 accepted resources in nomenclature by saying Carya 

 pecan, var. Stuartii. When naming hybrid varieties, 

 however, I would suggest that in advance of the 

 abbreviation "var." we place the abbreviation "hyb." 

 Thus reading for Brown's pecan (f Carya pecan, hyb. 

 var. Brownii'* instead of Carya Brownii, which lat- 

 ter binomial would throw it among the species in- 

 stead of among the varieties. In view of the fact 

 that we are to have hundreds of named hybrids to 

 deal with shortly it seems to me that we must adopt 

 some such definite method for convenience promptly. 

 This method of naming relates to convenience only 



