CALLITROPSIS NOOTKATENSIS

 

 

 

Callitropsis nootkatensis (D. Don) Oersted, 1864

 

One plant, four names… If one turns to page 584 in Conifers Around the World, there will be a citation slightly different from the one above; in the book we gave it as (D. Don) Oersted ex D. P. Little, 2006. Remarkably, just after a few weeks the C.A.W. came out, Didier Maerki and Michael Frankis reported on a previously overlooked publication in which the noted Danish authority, Anders Sandoe Örsted explicitly used (and validly published) Callitropsis nootkatensis. We, the authors of C.A.W. maintain that after several name changes (from Cupressus to Chamaecyparis then Callitropsis and finally Xanthocyparis) the proper generic name of the Nootka cypress is Callitropsis. Örsted had a good point and has to be credited properly; of course if C.A.W. needs to be re-printed this small but important correction in the citation will have to be made. The Örsted portrait here also reproduced is a courtesy of the Library of the University of Copenhagen. – I.R.