Patersonia [SEP] parent taxon
Patersonia
Patersonia is a genus of flowering plants in the Iridaceae commonly known as native iris or native flag. It was first described as a genus in 1807 by Robert Brown. It is native to Australia, New Guinea, New Caledonia, and insular Southeast Asia. The genus name is a tribute to the first Lieutenant Governor of New South Wales in Australia, William Paterson.
They are perennials with basal leaves growing from a woody rhizome that in some species extends above ground to form a short trunk. The leaves are
Taxon in disguise
In bacteriology, a taxon in disguise is a species, genus or higher unit of biological classification whose evolutionary history reveals has evolved from another unit of similar or lower rank, making the parent unit paraphyletic. This happens when rapid evolution makes a new species appear radically different from the ancestral group, so that it is not (initially) recognised as belonging to the parent phylogenetic group, leaving the latter an evolutionary grade.
While the term is from bacteriology, parallel examples are found throughout the tree of