Shortia galacifolia
Encyclopedia
Shortia galacifolia is a rare plant of the Southern Appalachians in the family Diapensiaceae
. It is a relict herb which long bewitched Asa Gray, the eminent American botanist, a saga detailed in the paper "Asa Gray and his quest for Shortia glaucifolia" [Arnoldia Vol. 2, 13-26. 1942]. Gray had seen a fragment of the plant in the Paris herbarium in 1838, and had long sought it in the wild in the mountains of North Carolina. It was not rediscovered until 1877.
Diapensiaceae
Diapensiaceae is a small family of flowering plants, comprising 12 species in five genera. Three of the genera, Berneuxia, Galax, and Pyxidanthera, contain only a single species. The Asian species of Shortia were formerly separated as the genus Schizocodon, and some authors still recognize S....
. It is a relict herb which long bewitched Asa Gray, the eminent American botanist, a saga detailed in the paper "Asa Gray and his quest for Shortia glaucifolia" [Arnoldia Vol. 2, 13-26. 1942]. Gray had seen a fragment of the plant in the Paris herbarium in 1838, and had long sought it in the wild in the mountains of North Carolina. It was not rediscovered until 1877.