In article ,
Stewart Robert Hinsley wrote:

The Rosaceae is divided into subfamilies. The peach belongs to one
subfamily, Amygdaloideae. Within this family it belongs to the genus
Prunus - it being Prunus persica. The most closely related fruit to the
peach is the nectarine, which is a variety (i.e. within the same
species) of peach without the surface fuzz. I'd guess the most closely
related species is the apricot, Prunus armeniaca, but as there's several
hundred species of Prunus there's ample opportunity for me to be wrong
on this point.

I'd guess that peach and almond are most closely related of the
domesticated species, based on the similarity of that thing which
surrounds the seed which we were just told is not part of it, no matter
what it looks like. Also, peach and almond have been crossed to
introduce more cold-hardiness into the almond. (And, as you say, peach
is in the subfamily Amygdaloideae ;-))

Apricot crosses easily with Japanese plums (P.salicina). The crosses
are sometimes called plumcots (or apriums), but some plum cultivars
like Early Golden, which derives from a chance seedling and is a
popular commercial variety in Ontario, are thought to be natural
hybrids. Japanese and several American species of 'plum' Prunus have
the same chromosome number and cross readily to produce many cold hardy
cultivars which resemble the Japanese parent in edible quality, but are
much smaller. The European plum has a different chromosome number and
doesn't cross with any of these northeast Asian and North American species.
There's also been a lot of crossing of Canadian prairie and Siberian
species of 'cherry' Prunus with 'plum' Prunus to produce 'chums' or
just cherry-like Prunus with much better eating quality than the wild
species, that are also hardy under really awful conditions of cold
and drought.

What happened to that splitter movement a little while back that was
going to raise up Persica, Armeniaca and other genera in a desperate
effort to make sense out of this very diverse yet closely interrelated
lot of stone fruits?

Btw, if you Know Your Prunus, you can appall passers-by by grazing on
some of the ornamental ones, like teh Nanking cherry, which is quite
good flavoured, though rather big on pit and small on flesh. The white
ones in particular freak people out when they see you eating them. I
don't recommend any of the native chokecherries, though: even the best
of them, the black cherries (P.serotina), are awfully astringent. All
the Amelanchier spp I've tried are very good, too.

From: (Iris Cohen)

They have many
traits in common with apples: five petals, five stamens, alternate leaves,
etc.

Erm, in most members of the rose family, there are numerous stamens. 5 sepals,
5 petals, many stamens (5 or 10 in some), 1-many pistils.

Sean



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From: (Beverly Erlebacher)

As another unnatural effect of domestication, some apple cultivars are
triploid, and produce nonfunctional pollen. I've occasionally wondered
whether there are triploids with nonfunctional ova, but good pollen, but
we never hear about them because nobody wants an apple tree that doesn't
produce apples, no matter how good the pollen is. Come to think of it,
people do seem to want fruitless fruit trees as ornamentals. Maybe there'd
be big bucks in a fruitless ornamental crabapple. No squashed rotten
crabs tracked into the house, or people slipping on them and suing you.


More often when plants have triploids, the result is no seeds in the fruit.
Examples are seedless grapes and seedless bananas.

Sean



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"P van Rijckevorsel" schrieb
Technically the hard stuff is part of the fruit, and the actual
seed is inside the hard stuff

Iris Cohen schreef
Remember, this is a layman who did not know how to do a Google search
to get that far.

Iris,

+ + +
I did keep that in mind. Do note that this is someone who happily throws
about terms such as "chromosome" and "gene". A little knowledge is a
dangerous thing. I still feel it is wisest to aim at accuracy (without
going into boring detail)even when using a word such as "seed". Who knows
what your innocuous remark might have led too ...
PvR

Claudio Jolowicz schreef
I am not a person who throws about terms without knowing what they mean.
Although I am not a biologist, I have tried to understand some concepts
of genetics. It enabled me to understand the last paragraph in Steward
Robert Hinsley's post. Still I wouldn't throw about the terms he used,
without rereading their exact definitions.

+ + +
All the more reason for a little care when using terms
PvR

Beverly Erlebacher schreef
What happened to that splitter movement a little while back that was
going to raise up Persica, Armeniaca and other genera in a desperate
effort to make sense out of this very diverse yet closely interrelated
lot of stone fruits?

+ + +
They seem to be lying low, waiting for the molecular storms to abate. IIRC
the molecular stuff does recognize grouping within Prunus s.l. but they do
not conform exactly with earlier splits. Cerasus appears to belong together
with Laurocerasus and one other "old" genus (I forget which).

If these groups will ever be raised to the level of genus is a different
matter. Splits of large genera are not popular, just think of what happened
when Eucalyptus was split.
PvR

Xref: 127.0.0.1 sci.bio.botany:17706

PS: Really nitpicking, it is best not to mix Greek and Latin in one term,
so preferably it is either "monotypic" or "unispecific" ...

Stewart Robert Hinsley schreef
Google: 67 hits for unispecific; 8420 for monospecific. (And 9880 for
monotypic.)
--
Stewart Robert Hinsley

Lycos:
"monotypic": 15414
"monospecific": 5072
"unispecific": 40
Some cross-language hybrids are even more popular, notably "automobile".
This does not mean that a little care in using language is not a good idea.
pvR

That is unless the plants are apomictic (as in dandelions, for example)!


Sean Houtman wrote in message
...
From: (Beverly Erlebacher)

As another unnatural effect of domestication, some apple cultivars are
triploid, and produce nonfunctional pollen. I've occasionally wondered
whether there are triploids with nonfunctional ova, but good pollen, but
we never hear about them because nobody wants an apple tree that doesn't
produce apples, no matter how good the pollen is. Come to think of it,
people do seem to want fruitless fruit trees as ornamentals. Maybe
there'd
be big bucks in a fruitless ornamental crabapple. No squashed rotten
crabs tracked into the house, or people slipping on them and suing you.


More often when plants have triploids, the result is no seeds in the
fruit.
Examples are seedless grapes and seedless bananas.

Sean



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In article , Beverly
Erlebacher writes

I'd guess that peach and almond are most closely related of the
domesticated species, based on the similarity of that thing which
surrounds the seed which we were just told is not part of it, no matter
what it looks like. Also, peach and almond have been crossed to
introduce more cold-hardiness into the almond. (And, as you say, peach
is in the subfamily Amygdaloideae ;-))

I was skimming through Bean yesterday, and according to them you're
right, or near enough so. Peach and almond are both placed in subgenus
Amygdalus, but there's some support for splitting the peach off as
subgenus Persica. I don't think any of the other almonds and peaches are
domesticated, but Prunus tenella, at least, is grown as an ornamental.
--
Stewart Robert Hinsley

From: (Iris Cohen)

They have many
traits in common with apples: five petals, five stamens, alternate leaves,
etc.

Erm, in most members of the rose family, there are numerous stamens. 5 sepals,
5 petals, many stamens (5 or 10 in some), 1-many pistils.

Sean



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