page_title: Adenanthos
section_title: Relationships within the genus
hierarchical_section_title: Adenanthos / Taxonomy / Relationships within the genus
caption_attribution_description: Adenanthos detmoldii Royal Botanic Gardens, Cranbourne photo - Cas Liber -Oct 03
context_page_description: Adenanthos is a genus of Australian native shrubs in the flowering plant family Proteaceae. Variable in habit and leaf shape, it is the only genus in the family where solitary flowers are the norm. It was discovered in 1791, and formally published by Jacques Labillardière in 1805. The type species is Adenanthos cuneatus, and 33 species are recognised. The genus is placed in subfamily Proteoideae, and is held to be most closely related to several South African genera.
  Endemic to Australia, its centre of diversity is southwest Western Australia, where 31 species occur. The other two species occur in South Australia and western Victoria. They are mainly pollinated by birds.
context_section_description: The first infrageneric arrangement of Adenanthos was published in 1870 by George Bentham, in the fifth volume of his landmark Flora Australiensis. Bentham divided the genus into two sections on the basis of floral characteristics. Two species were unusual in having flowers with one sterile stamen, and perianth tubes that are curved and swollen above the middle; these were placed in A. sect. Eurylaema. The remaining twelve known species were placed in A. sect. Stenolaema.
  A phenetic analysis of the genus undertaken by Ernest Charles Nelson in 1975 yielded results in which the members of A. sect. Eurylaema occurred together. Nelson therefore retained Bentham's two sections in his 1978 revision of Adenanthos, though A. sect Stenolaema was renamed to the autonym A. sect. Adenanthos in accordance with modern rules of botanical nomenclature. He further divided A. sect. Adenanthos into two subsections, A. subsect. Anaclastos and A. subsect. Adenanthos, but discarded them again in his 1995 treatment of the genus for the Flora of Australia series. By this time, the ICBN had issued a ruling that all genera ending in -anthos must be treated as having masculine gender. This resulted in orthographic changes to all species names in the genus; for example, A. obovata became A. obovatus.
  Nelson's arrangement of Adenanthos is as follows:
  Adenanthos
  A. sect. Eurylaema
  A. detmoldii
  A. barbiger
  A. obovatus
  A. × pamela
  A. sect. Adenanthos
  A. drummondii
  A. dobagii
  A. apiculatus
  A. linearis
  A. pungens
  A. pungens subsp. pungens
  A. pungens subsp. effusus
  A. gracilipes
  A. venosus
  A. dobsonii
  A. glabrescens
  A. glabrescens subsp. glabrescens
  A. glabrescens subsp. exasperatus
  A. ellipticus
  A. cuneatus
  A. stictus
  A. ileticos
  A. forrestii
  A. eyrei
  A. cacomorphus
  A. flavidiflorus
  A. argyreus
  A. macropodianus
  A. terminalis
  A. sericeus
  A. sericeus subsp. sericeus
  A. sericeus subsp. sphalma
  A. × cunninghamii
  A. oreophilus
  A. cygnorum
  A. cygnorum subsp. cygnorum
  A. cygnorum subsp. chamaephyton
  A. meisneri
  A. velutinus
  A. filifolius
  A. labillardierei
  A. acanthophyllus
caption: A. detmoldii
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