Talk:Buckeye

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As "Buckeye" is only the US name for the trees, and the article includes information on Europe etc, the title doesn't seem suitable to me. Would "Horse Chestnut" be OK in other forms of English, too? (Apart from British.) Or should it be Aesculus? Saintswithin 20:44, 29 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Normally, the main article should be at Aesculus. However, the bulk of species, to the best of my understanding, are called buckeye. The horsechestnut (note compound form! It is NOT a chestnut, and so should be either hyphenated or compound) is an exception; it was once placed in its own genus, Hippocastanum, and is an important tree in its own right. I would support treating this either way: main article at Aesculus, or main article at Buckeye, because it's a sort of ambiguous situation, since the rules are that if the members of a genus are generally known by one common name, that's the article, whereas if members are known by various names, then the genus is the correct article. jaknouse 16:55, 1 Aug 2004 (UTC)

In Britain, we call Aesculus "Horse Chestnut" as well as Aesculus Hippocastanum; it's an ambiguous name. I guess, then, that "horse chestnut" perhaps only refers to Hippocastanum in the US? If so, my addition about usage of the word needs changing; I did look it up in Webster's, though, and it had the more general meaning, so it might be regional. I'd never heard of "buckeye" before, which is why I found the redirect confusing and added the explanation. I have nothing against US English but the tree does not only grow in the US so perhaps the name should be more international.

I know what you mean about hyphenating, but English plant names, IMHO, simply do not differentiate between plant species as well as the Latin names, and I prefer using the Latin name rather than experimenting with new punctuation rules no-one else will understand (or is this punctuation rule in a dictionary? It isn't in mine.) I've hyphenated the phrase in the text, though, as User:MPF suggested, to keep the articles homogeneous, and as a sign of my willingness to compromise!

Could we agree on "Aesculus" as the title? Saintswithin 11:24, 2 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The North American native species of Aesculus (7 species) are known as buckeyes, and the Eurasian native species (13 species) are known as horse chestnut / horse-chestnut / horsechestnut; this applies to usage on both sides of the Atlantic (i.e., Aesculus flava is known everywhere as Yellow Buckeye, Aesculus turbinata is known everywhere as Japanese Horse-chestnut). I'd agree with moving the page to Aesculus (and had already thought of doing so, just hadn't got round to it); as this seems a popular idea I'll institute it.

Of the Latin name, A. hippocastanum is the type species which defines the genus Aesculus, so the suggested transfer of it to a separate genus Hippocastanum is invalid. Some of the species (those with no spines on the fruit husk and 4, not 5, flower petals) were once occasionally split off in the seperate genus Pavia (type species Aesculus pavia), but these characters do not always match (some species have smooth husks and 5 petals, etc), and it does not align with the Old/New World divide anyway. - MPF 09:27, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Aesculus

I'll second the move to Aesculus. I've just added some external links for the aesculus genus. Mikcohen 05:46, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

A bit more on the move - I'm not doing a whole page move, so as to keep Buckeye as a disambiguation page with the place names, etc. Instead, I'm cutting & pasting the main botanical section across to Aesculus. That means this discussion also stays here at Talk:Buckeye instead of moving to Talk:Aesculus, but I can move this as well if people like. - MPF 09:35, 11 Aug 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Buckeye nut

Where the hell is the link to the Buckeye nut?

[edit] Buckeyes

This disambiguation should include buckeyes that currently links to OSU only. Rhhs 22:16, 2 January 2006 (UTC)