A numerical approach to the taxonomy of some species of the subtribe cassiinae in Nigeria

Abstract

Twelve morphological parameters from the leaves, fruits, and pedicel of fif-teen (15) species of the subtribe Cassiinae were studied using the methods of numerical taxonomy. Characters such as leaflet length, leaflet width, and leaflet length/width ratio contributed significantly in the delimitation of the species studied. While C. ital-ica and Ch. mimosoides are the most closely related taxa, C. fistula and C. singueana appear to be the most distantly related as reflected by the cluster coefficients. Further illustrations as revealed by the dendrogram and scatter plot generated placed the 15 studied species into three groups. While we acknowledge the relevance of phylogenetic analysis in taxonomic studies as it is in recent times, we strongly support the applica-tion of numerical taxonomy to compliment findings.