Gagea (sect. Minimae) Davlianidze

Gagea sect. Minimae (Pascher) Davlianidze Although monophyly of this section was highly supported in analyses conducted by Zarrei et al. (2009) and Peterson et al. (2008), its relationship with other sections in clade D (Figure 4 in Zarrei et al. 2009) is unclear because they form a polytomy. Since the morphological differences between species belonging to G. sect. Minimae are not great, its current rank is probably not appropriate, and it should be merged with other sections in clade D and be reduced to a taxon of lower rank. A "shortly branched inflorescence with alternate phyllotaxis", as described by Peterson et al. (2008), and a flattened basal leaf (Zarrei et al. 2009) are putative synapomorphies of sect. Minimae, which is not recognised here.
Published as part of Zarrei, Mehdi, Wilkin, Paul, Ingrouille, Martin J. & Chase, And Mark W., 2011, A revised infrageneric classification for Gagea Salisb. (Tulipeae; Liliaceae): insights from DNA sequence and morphological data, pp. 44-56 in Phytotaxa 15 on page 50, DOI: 10.11646/phytotaxa.15.1.6, http://zenodo.org/record/4894104
{"references":["Zarrei, M., Wilkin, P., Fay, M. F., Ingrouille, M. J., Zarre, S. & Chase, M. W. (2009) Molecular systematics of Gagea and Lloydia (Liliaceae; Liliales): implications of analyses of nuclear ribosomal and plastid sequences for infrageneric classification. Annals of Botany 104: 125 - 142.","Peterson, A., Levichev, I. G. & Peterson, J. (2008) Systematics of Gagea and Lloydia (Liliaceae) and infrageneric classification of Gagea based on molecular and morphological data. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 46: 446 - 465."]}