Pseudolarix Gordon & Glend.

Pseudolarix is perhaps best known as one of only five genera of conifers that lose their foliage in winter, the others being Larix, Glyptostrobus, Metasequoia and Taxodium. It is one of ten monospecific conifer genera with a distribution restricted to eastern Asia; the others are Cathaya, Cryptomeria, Fokienia, Glyptostrobus, Metasequoia, Nothotsuga, Sciadopitys, Taiwania, and Thujopsis.

Golden Larch resembles the true larches in foliage and branching, but it is distinct in its clustered male catkins (solitary in Larix), and in the large woody scales of the cone, which falls to pieces when ripe (remaining intact in Larix) (Bean 1976). Phylogenetically, Pseudolarix is in fact closer to the familiar genera Abies, Cedrus and Tsuga than it is to Larix. Together with the lesser-known Keteleeria and Nothotsuga, these genera make up the subfamily Abietoideae in the Pinaceae (Larix is in the Pinoideae along with Pseudotsuga, Picea, Cathaya and Pinus itself). Despite their names, in which pseudo means ‘false’, Pseudolarix is most closely related to Tsuga and Nothotsuga, while Larix is most closely related to Pseudotsuga (Yang et al. 2022; Gernandt et al. 2018).

The fossil record indicates a former widespread distribution of the genus, including the extant Pseudolarix amabilis and at least one other species, in North America and Eurasia, dating back to at least the Early Cretaceous and possibly the Late Jurassic (c. 100–160 mya) (Farjon 2017). According to LePage and Basinger (1995), the morphological stasis of Pseudolarix fossils suggests the genus was never diverse and the lineage has remained virtually intact over time. Pseudolarix may be the oldest known genus of the Pinaceae that is still living.

The naming of false larch got off to a false start in 1854 when Lindley examined specimens sent from China by Fortune and decided they were the same as the Japanese Larch (Larix kaempferi, but known then as Abies kaempferi) (Lindley 1854). This confusion between the Japanese Larch and the Chinese false-larch meant that the plant’s challenging taxonomy was further confused by nomenclatural niceties, which made establishing an acceptable name for the plant a complex process. In 1858, Gordon and Glendinning correctly decided it was not a larch and introduced a new genus name when they published Pseudolarix kaempferi. However, though they mentioned that this name was for the plants found by Fortune in China, they listed Abies kaempferi and Larix kaempferi as the synonyms it replaced. This meant that it also applied to the Japanese Larch, so was flawed. The genus name met with resistance due to the negative connotations of its meaning: it derives from ancient Greek ψευδής (pseudḗs = ‘false’) + λάριξ (lárix = ‘larch’) (wiktionary.org 2025). For Murray, Pseudolarix was ‘a vile phrase,’ half Latin and half Greek (he was wrong: the Latin larix derives from Greek), and untrue:

“Nature produces nothing false—and if she did, this is not a false larch. It would be as reasonable to say that the larch is a false Pseudo-larix … If the species is to have a sub-generic name at all, it should, and no doubt it will, be changed; but we have so great a dislike to changing names, even where they are bad, that we leave this to some other hand to do. (Murray 1863)”

The ‘other hand’ turned out to be John Nelson, who in 1866 proposed to keep the plant in genus Larix but put forward the epithet amabilis, from Latin meaning ‘lovable, lovely’, not before railing against the nitpickers: ‘This is a Fir … which has caused no little consternation and much disputation amongst botanic pedants, particularly the hair-splitters’ (Nelson 1866). The disputation, however, did not cease there. In 1890, Mayr, not aware of Nelson’s lovely epithet, saw the need to replace the misapplied kaempferi and felt the name should honour its discoverer, so he published Pseudolarix fortunei; in 1900, Kent echoed Murray in objecting to Gordon’s ‘negative name’ for the genus and replaced it with Laricopsis (= ‘looks like’ Larix). Then in 1919, Rehder called the house to order by pointing out the priority of Gordon’s generic name and Nelson’s epithet, and established the new combination Pseudolarix amabilis. This quelled discussion, but only for a few decades: Gordon’s false start would return to haunt the name when in 1965 Moore pointed out that, according to the type method espoused by the rules of nomenclature, Pseudolarix was a synonym of Larix, as it had been applied to the Japanese Larch, and he proposed to replace it with Chrysolarix (ancient Greek for ‘golden larch’). The hair-splitting that ensued (Bullock & Hunt 1966; Moore 1966; Bullock 1966; McVaugh 1968; Moore 1973; Hara 1977; Tjaden 1980; Hara & Brummit 1980; Nicolson 1980) would have made Nelson turn in his grave, and constituted ‘possibly the all-time champion of nonmenclatural disputes’ (Wilbur 1981). It was eventually resolved in 1983 when Hara and Yü proposed to conserve Pseudolarix with a type specimen, thus rescuing Pseudolarix amabilis, the name currently considered correct.

A second species of Pseudolarix was proposed by Yvette de Ferré in 1944, as P. pourtetii, and supported by Gaussen in 1966. The distinction was based on morphological (mainly leaf size) and geographical grounds. Li (1967) found that de Ferré’s geographical notion was confused and often inaccurate, and argued that leaf size is variable and that there is no valid ground for differentiating the genus into two distinct species or even varieties. The plant described by Ferré may have been only a juvenile form (Li 1968).