Both Commelinaceae

Commelina erecta vs Tinantia anomala

These two are not on this page because a keyword tool suggested them. They are here because our own identification model genuinely mistook one for the other, on real photographs, 3 times. We publish the rate, and then we tell you what actually separates them.

Confused 3x by our model Method published

Side by sidefigs. a and b

Commelina erecta, photographed by Ryan Watson
fig. a Ryan Watson, CC BY 4.0

Commelina erecta

whitemouth dayflower
Tinantia anomala, photographed by Reid Hardin
fig. b Reid Hardin, CC BY 4.0

Tinantia anomala

False dayflower

How often our model gets it wrong measured, not estimated

When the plant was The model said How often
Tinantia anomala Commelina erecta 3 of 18 (17%)

Measured on 38,299 openly licensed, research-grade photographs. Full method and dataset.

What actually separates themon the record

Family Both Commelinaceae. The family does not separate them.
Genus Commelina versus Tinantia.
Flowering Peaks in April versus April. Timing does not separate them. (n = 10,563 and 462.)

What we do not have yet: the diagnostic morphological character that a botanist would key on, from a source we can cite. We are not going to invent one. Until we have it, this page tells you the two are genuinely confusable, how often, and what the taxonomy and the flowering data do and do not settle.

Both recordsfull pages