Two Well-Known but Previously Undescribed Species of Monarda (Lamiaceae), M. maxmedleyi and M. simmersii from the Southeastern United States
Abstract
Two new species of Monarda L. subg. Monarda (Lamiaceae), M. maxmedleyi J. J. N. Campbell & Floden and M. simmersii J. J. N. Campbell & Floden, are described and illustrated. These are compared to related species by using factor analysis of mixed data (FAMD) and principal component analysis (PCA) based on a dataset of 22 morphological characters from closely related species in the M. fistulosa species group. Monarda maxmedleyi has had the names M. russeliana Nutt. ex Sims and M. virgata Raf. misapplied to it. The species is known mostly from the eastern Knobs region of Kentucky and a few nearby sites, where it occurs in subxeric woodland and edges on medium acid soils largely derived from siltstone or on transitions from limestone to sandstone. In morphology it is most similar to M. brevis (Fosberg & L. Artz) Floden, which occurs ca. 300 miles to the east in the Ridge-and-Valley region of West Virginia. Monarda simmersii occurs in the Interior Low Plateau of Tennessee north through Kentucky on the Mississippian Plateau and Western Coal Fields to southern Indiana and southwest Ohio typically on exposed crumbling limestone. It is most similar in morphology to M. austroappalachiana Floden, which occurs in the southern Unaka Mountains and southern Cumberland Plateau of northern Georgia and southeastern Tennessee around Lookout Mountain. These form a morphologically and edaphically similar group of early-flowering species in the Southeastern United States.
