Apiaceae and Rubiaceae

Torilis arvensis vs Trichogalium boreale

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

Torilis arvensis, photographed by saltyhiker
fig. a saltyhiker, CC BY 4.0

Torilis arvensis

common hedge parsley
Trichogalium boreale, photographed by Aleksei Baushev
fig. b Aleksei Baushev, CC BY 4.0

Trichogalium boreale

Northern Bedstraw

How often our model gets it wrong measured, not estimated

When the plant was The model said How often
Trichogalium boreale Torilis arvensis 3 of 20 (15%)

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

What actually separates themon the record

Family Apiaceae versus Rubiaceae. Different families, which is a real separation.
Genus Torilis versus Trichogalium.
Flowering Peaks in June versus June. Timing does not separate them. (n = 1,635 and 2,681.)

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