Friday, May 29, 2009

Existance* (for Existence, etc.)

A few days ago, I received an e-mail message–complete with photos–about the wondrous “Rare Parrot Flower” from Thailand. Having gotten many hoax messages over the years, I was immediately skeptical of this beauty’s existence. However, Hoax-Slayer at least seems to agree that it’s real, and Impatiens psittacina, first described by the botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker, is listed in the International Plant Names Index.

Existance* is a typo of high probability and retrieves 32 hits in the OhioLINK database. Some are already identified as typos by the presence of [sic] immediately following, but others occur in transcribed fields and would have to be checked.

(Parrot Flower, from Hoax-Slayer and my own Inbox)

Deb Kulczak

No comments: