What's in a Plant's Scientific Name?

You will notice that I always use the scientific names of plants. I'm not just showing off my erudition, it's because with plants, getting the right name matters. Here's a horror story from my past to explain it to you in non-gardener terms.

A Tale of Two Guys. Back in the dark ages, before Internet and cell phones, or even dorm rooms with phones in them, I got a message (via the desk manager who answered all incoming calls and put hand-written message slips in our mail boxes) from a guy who said he was "Mike Burrows". He had just transferred from another school, recognized my name from the student directory, and wanted to chat over coffee to get some information about classes and professors. If interested, would I please call him back?

Mike Burrows! I was doing the happy dance of the no-longer-dateless all over my dorm room! He was a year ahead of me in school, a hottie, an athlete and really smart. So, after a 30-second pause to prove to myself I wasn't desperately dateless, I called him back and had a DATE!

Next night I heard the "BZZZ! BZZZ! BZZZZZZZZ!" buzzer code for "you have a visitor" (talk about dark ages, we weren't allowed to have guys in the dorm, except in the lobby, which may give you an idea how ancient I really am) and I'm headed for the elevator with a big smile.

I reach the lobby and oh crap! It wasn't Mike Burrows! It was Mike Burrows, a distant cousin of the guy I thought I had a date with ... not hot, not smart, not an athlete. Even worse, he decided I was cute and it took me most of the semester to get rid of him.

The moral of this tale; a common name is not enough.

As far as plants are concerned, only the scientific name is reliable. I can think of four vines with the common name of "Queen's Wreath", but only Antigonon leptopus is the heat-loving, drought tolerant Queen's Wreath that can survive in Phoenix.

There's also "Yellow Morning Glory", which is yellow, but it's not related to the other plants commonly called morning glories and it blooms all day, not just in the morning. If that isn't confusing enough, the other common name for it is "Yuca" (yuca, not yucca, which is the name of a family of grassy plants). If you want the drought-tolerant vine with pretty yellow flowers, ask for Merremia aurea and you will get the right thing.

This holds true for plants with cultivars, which are to the plant world like breeds are for domestic animals. There are cultivars of Leucophyllum frutescens (common name Texas Ranger) with predictable adult height of 3-4 feet, compared to the wild form's 8-12 feet. If you grab any old "Texas Ranger" you never know what you will get.

Beware of catalogs and nurseries that do not give scientific names and cultivar names. It's like having a blind date with a plant.