Dec 22, 2016 19:36
7 yrs ago
Spanish term
lechugones
Spanish to English
Science
Botany
Text from the Canary Islands
En las zonas más elevadas pasteles de risco y bejeques, Greenovia aurea, Aeonium simsii, A. percarneum, o lechugones como Babcockia platylepis, y especies de otras familias como Limonium o Globularia.
Proposed translations
(English)
3 +5 | dandelion varieties | Robert Carter |
4 +4 | sow thistles | Charles Davis |
5 | dandelion-flowered Composites | DLyons |
3 | chichories | Anne Schulz |
Change log
Dec 22, 2016 19:36: changed "Kudoz queue" from "In queue" to "Public"
Proposed translations
+5
1 hr
Selected
dandelion varieties
This page provides the synonym for "Babcockia platylepis", which is "Sonchus platylepis Webb"
http://www.theplantlist.org/tpl1.1/record/gcc-5435
And if you look up "Sonchus", you find:
Sonchus is a genus of flowering plants in the dandelion tribe within the sunflower family.
Not sure how accurate the term "varieties" is here, but I didn't want to go for "species" as taxonomy is a minefield for laymen like me (meaning I don't understand it). From what I can tell, particularly from looking at pictures, "dandelion" is a safe bet.
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Note added at 1 hr (2016-12-22 20:47:23 GMT)
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Sorry, forgot the link for the above reference:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonchus
http://www.theplantlist.org/tpl1.1/record/gcc-5435
And if you look up "Sonchus", you find:
Sonchus is a genus of flowering plants in the dandelion tribe within the sunflower family.
Not sure how accurate the term "varieties" is here, but I didn't want to go for "species" as taxonomy is a minefield for laymen like me (meaning I don't understand it). From what I can tell, particularly from looking at pictures, "dandelion" is a safe bet.
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Note added at 1 hr (2016-12-22 20:47:23 GMT)
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Sorry, forgot the link for the above reference:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonchus
Peer comment(s):
agree |
Helena Chavarria
: I also found dandelions but I wasn't sure enough to suggest it as an answer. First of all I found lettuces, but it didn't convince me, mainly because the photos of Lactuca tenerrima (lechugón) didn't look like lettuces.
3 mins
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Thanks, Helena. We have plants called "lechugilla" out here, but they're a kind of smallish agave-type cactuses, nothing much like a lettuce at all, as far as I can tell.
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agree |
neilmac
: Apparently you can eat dandelion leaves from some varieties, but I've never tried it...
12 mins
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Thanks, Neil. Someone showed me that rocket grows wild around my in-laws' house the other day, and all this time I'd been paying through the nose for it from Costco!
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agree |
Marie Wilson
27 mins
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Thanks, Marie.
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agree |
Elizabeth Joy Pitt de Morales
: AKA "Canarian tree dandelion"
58 mins
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Thanks, Elizabeth, good to know.
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neutral |
Charles Davis
: You've understandably been misled by the term "dandelion tribe", a very broad category, which includes many things that are not dandelions. / Indigenous Canarian species, mostly no EN common names, but in principle Sonchus = generically sow thistle.
3 hrs
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Nearly all you've said in your entry sounds perfectly good, only I looked at "sow thistles" too, but couldn't tell if the particular species mentioned is actually a sow thistle, so I went for a more generic term (not to say that it's correct of course).
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agree |
Nedra Rivera Huntington
3 hrs
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Thanks, Nedra.
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4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer.
Comment: "Selected automatically based on peer agreement."
+4
4 hrs
sow thistles
I agree with some of what Robert has said. All the plants in the Canaries that are referred to as "lechugones" belong to the genus Sonchus. As he has said, Babcockia platylepis, referred to as a "lechugón" in the extract you've quoted, is also known as Sonchus playlepsis. The same goes for the "lechugón" par excellence, the plant that is always called by that name, Sventenia bupleuroides, the "lechugón de Sventenius" or "cerraja de Don Enrique":
http://www3.gobiernodecanarias.org/medusa/wiki/index.php?tit...
It's the same thing as Sonchus bupleuroides:
http://www.theplantlist.org/tpl1.1/record/gcc-89293
Other plants I find called "lechugón" include Sonchus hierrensis, here in this official guide to the Caldera de Taburiente National Park, in the illustration on p. 49; it also says on the previous page: "Otras especies de los roquedos se desprenden de sus hojas en la época seca reduciendo así la superficie transpirante. Es el caso de los llamativos lechugones o cerrajones"
http://www.mapama.gob.es/imagenes/es/Guia Caldera_tcm7-29216...
So "lechugón" is a name in the Canaries for at least some species of Sonchus (there are others apart from the ones I've mentioned). They are also often called cerraja o cerrajón. In this list of common names for Canarian flora and fauna, the only "lechugón" is the emblematic "lechugón de Sventenius" I've already mentioned; the Sonchus species are mostly called cerrajón.
http://www.antoniomachado.net/wp-content/uploads/pdf/informa...
Now, the Wikipedia page on Sonchus, which Robert has already cited, says that the generic name for these plants in English is sow thistles, and many other sources confirm that this is right. It's definitely as close as we can get to an English equivalent of "lechugón" as the name is used in the Canaries.
None of them are dandelions. Some of them look like dandelions to the untrained eye (such as mine), and they're cousins, as it were, but they aren't the same thing. True dandelions are members of the genus Taraxacum, and in the Canaries, as elsewhere, their common name is "diente de león".
Now, sow thistles are members of the so-called "dandelion tribe", as the Wikipedia page on Sonchus says. This is a misleading term. It is a traditional name for what are nowadays called the Cichorieae, but have in the past had other names, notably Lactuceae.
"The dandelion tribe Cichorieae (Lactuceae) of Asteraceae is cosmopolitan and has its basal clades and also its sister group (Gundelieae) [...]"
https://books.google.es/books?id=xHGljMH_RLYC&pg=PA25&lpg=PA...
This so-called "dandelion tribe" includes 93 genera and over 1600 species, including, yes, dandelions, as well as lettuces, chicory, salsify and many others. So to call sow thistles "varieties of dandelion" is equivalent to calling lettuces "varieties of dandelion". The latter only seems more ridiculous because lettuces don't look anything like dandelions whereas sow thistles do, but scientifically it would be just as accurate (or inaccurate). It is misleading, to say the least.
The other attraction of calling them dandelions is that everyone has heard of dandelions whereas few people have heard of sow thistles, but that's not an argument at all. If that's what they are, that's what they are. And it is.
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Note added at 4 hrs (2016-12-23 00:14:44 GMT)
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And the fact that Sonchus canariensis, the tree sonchus or tree sow thistle or giant sow thistle, which Elizabeth has mentioned, is popularly called the "tree dandelion" doesn't mean that it's really a dandelion.
Needless to say, sow thistles are not really thistles, any more than they are dandelions.
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Note added at 7 hrs (2016-12-23 03:02:31 GMT)
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On Robert's point that we don't know for sure that these particular plants in the genus Sonchus, called lechugones, are called sow thistles in English: the problem is that they are Canarian plants and don't have English common names. But "sow thistle" is a name that applies to the whole genus: that is to say it is the recognised English name for the genus itself:
http://www.globalspecies.org/ntaxa/2089864
http://eol.org/pages/60801/names
So by definition these particular species of Sonchus are sow thistles. And as I say, there are others called lechugón, including:
Sonchus congestus
http://www3.gobiernodecanarias.org/medusa/mediateca/ecoescue...
Sonchus acaulis
http://www.cepalaspalmas.com/index.php?option=com_content&vi...
http://www3.gobiernodecanarias.org/medusa/wiki/index.php?tit...
It's the same thing as Sonchus bupleuroides:
http://www.theplantlist.org/tpl1.1/record/gcc-89293
Other plants I find called "lechugón" include Sonchus hierrensis, here in this official guide to the Caldera de Taburiente National Park, in the illustration on p. 49; it also says on the previous page: "Otras especies de los roquedos se desprenden de sus hojas en la época seca reduciendo así la superficie transpirante. Es el caso de los llamativos lechugones o cerrajones"
http://www.mapama.gob.es/imagenes/es/Guia Caldera_tcm7-29216...
So "lechugón" is a name in the Canaries for at least some species of Sonchus (there are others apart from the ones I've mentioned). They are also often called cerraja o cerrajón. In this list of common names for Canarian flora and fauna, the only "lechugón" is the emblematic "lechugón de Sventenius" I've already mentioned; the Sonchus species are mostly called cerrajón.
http://www.antoniomachado.net/wp-content/uploads/pdf/informa...
Now, the Wikipedia page on Sonchus, which Robert has already cited, says that the generic name for these plants in English is sow thistles, and many other sources confirm that this is right. It's definitely as close as we can get to an English equivalent of "lechugón" as the name is used in the Canaries.
None of them are dandelions. Some of them look like dandelions to the untrained eye (such as mine), and they're cousins, as it were, but they aren't the same thing. True dandelions are members of the genus Taraxacum, and in the Canaries, as elsewhere, their common name is "diente de león".
Now, sow thistles are members of the so-called "dandelion tribe", as the Wikipedia page on Sonchus says. This is a misleading term. It is a traditional name for what are nowadays called the Cichorieae, but have in the past had other names, notably Lactuceae.
"The dandelion tribe Cichorieae (Lactuceae) of Asteraceae is cosmopolitan and has its basal clades and also its sister group (Gundelieae) [...]"
https://books.google.es/books?id=xHGljMH_RLYC&pg=PA25&lpg=PA...
This so-called "dandelion tribe" includes 93 genera and over 1600 species, including, yes, dandelions, as well as lettuces, chicory, salsify and many others. So to call sow thistles "varieties of dandelion" is equivalent to calling lettuces "varieties of dandelion". The latter only seems more ridiculous because lettuces don't look anything like dandelions whereas sow thistles do, but scientifically it would be just as accurate (or inaccurate). It is misleading, to say the least.
The other attraction of calling them dandelions is that everyone has heard of dandelions whereas few people have heard of sow thistles, but that's not an argument at all. If that's what they are, that's what they are. And it is.
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 4 hrs (2016-12-23 00:14:44 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
And the fact that Sonchus canariensis, the tree sonchus or tree sow thistle or giant sow thistle, which Elizabeth has mentioned, is popularly called the "tree dandelion" doesn't mean that it's really a dandelion.
Needless to say, sow thistles are not really thistles, any more than they are dandelions.
--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 7 hrs (2016-12-23 03:02:31 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------
On Robert's point that we don't know for sure that these particular plants in the genus Sonchus, called lechugones, are called sow thistles in English: the problem is that they are Canarian plants and don't have English common names. But "sow thistle" is a name that applies to the whole genus: that is to say it is the recognised English name for the genus itself:
http://www.globalspecies.org/ntaxa/2089864
http://eol.org/pages/60801/names
So by definition these particular species of Sonchus are sow thistles. And as I say, there are others called lechugón, including:
Sonchus congestus
http://www3.gobiernodecanarias.org/medusa/mediateca/ecoescue...
Sonchus acaulis
http://www.cepalaspalmas.com/index.php?option=com_content&vi...
Peer comment(s):
agree |
Muriel Vasconcellos
4 hrs
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Many thanks, Muriel!
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agree |
Andy Watkinson
: The "Sventenia bupleuroides" clinched it for me. As me mum used to say "where there's a Sventenia bupleuroides, there's a sow thistle". Never a truer word....
4 hrs
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Clearly a wise and discerning woman, your mum. I wish I'd had someone to steer me right on this when I was a nipper. Happy Christmas, Andy :)
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agree |
neilmac
: .... but try not to sit on them... :-)
9 hrs
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No, but maybe you can feed them to donkeys. Apparently rabbits like them, and they're called sow thistles because they used to be fed to lactating sows. Thanks a lot, Neil :)
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agree |
Michele Fauble
19 hrs
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Many thanks, Michele, and Happy Christmas :)
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3 days 1 hr
dandelion-flowered Composites
Bye :-)
4 days
chichories
Green leafy vegetables, useful for preparing tasty leaf salads with a more or less bitter touch (which can be soothed by bathing them in hot water for about 10-15 seconds)... Yummy :-)
The following reference, although from German authors, confirms that Babcockia/Sonchus platylepsis belongs to the chicories:
www.bgbm.org/sites/default/files/documents/Cichorieae_Chapt...
The following reference, although from German authors, confirms that Babcockia/Sonchus platylepsis belongs to the chicories:
www.bgbm.org/sites/default/files/documents/Cichorieae_Chapt...
Discussion
The idea that this author, or indeed just about any author I could imagine, would be using "lechugones" in its "etymological" sense to mean Lactuceae seems to me exceedingly implausible. I don't think it's even worth considering. And I don't understand why you are suggesting "dandelion-flowered Composites". That term would include all sorts of things, including, of course, dandelions, that are not "lechugones". There's nothing to justify such a broad term.
There is no evidence, and no reason at all to suppose, that "lechugones" refers to any plant outside that genus. Your suggestion that it refers to the Hyoseridinae subtribe is entirely unsupported, and actually easily refuted, since the Canarian species that belong to that subtribe but to genera other than Sonchus have other common names: e.g. Hyoseris radiata (estrella) or Helminthotheca echioides (raspasaya de Canarias).
(Continued in next post)
But actually there is no reason to suppose, a priori, that lechugones refers to a taxon: to all and only the members of a particular genus, subtribe, tribe, etc. The only way of discovering what it does refer to is to investigate which plants are called lechugones in the Canaries.
(Continued in next post)
Our task here is simple, though not easy. We must try to determine what the author is referring to in using the term lechugones, and then try to find an English equivalent. If possible, we want a term of a similar kind, a common name, not a technical scientific name, and it should be a term that includes all lechugones and doesn't include anything else. If we ignore the latter requirement, it's quite easy. We might as well just put "flowers" and have done with it. But of course we can't ignore it. So we are going to need to set the generic level as low as possible without leaving out anything that the author regards as a lechugón. And I think it's obvious that the author doesn’t have big "lechugas" in mind in this context.
(Continued in next post)