Hambleton S, and Liu, M. The elusive Puccinia tritici-duri pathology, taxonomy and relationship to Puccinia recondita. 2019. Joint meeting of the Canadian Phytopathological Society and the Quebec Society for the Protection of Plants, 2018 / Réunion conjo

Common usage of the name Puccinia triticina Erikss. specifically for the fungus causing leaf rust of wheat is relatively recent in its taxonomic history. Described in 1899, subsequent names were as a forma specialis, variety or subspecies of P. dispersa Erikss. & Henning, P. rubigo-vera (DC.) G. Winter, P. perplexans Plowr. or P. persistens Plowr., until it was included as one of 52 synonyms in the P. recondita Roberge ex Desm. complex in 1971. By the 1980s in North America, the concept of a species restricted to wheat as its primary host was clearly articulated and accepted, with alternate hosts in the Ranunculaceae and clear morphological differences of the spores and sori. Another leaf rust species on wheat, Puccinia tritici-duri, was described by Viennot-Bourgin in 1941. It infects durum wheat but is thought to be restricted to Morroco, Spain and Portugal and to alternate hosts in the Boraginaceae. Tracking down information about the species was not straightforward. The name was not listed on-line in the fungal nomenclature databases, the original description was published in a difficult-to-locate journal, and references to this species were not always by name but rather implied. A review of published pathogenicity studies and phylogenetic analyses of brown leaf rust fungi suggests that Puccinia tritici-duri is closely related to Puccinia recondita sensu stricto and as such is one member of a lineage restricted to alternate hosts in the Boraginaceae. Analyses of DNA data for authentic specimens are needed to test this hypothesis and anchor the name taxonomically.