# Evidence Ledger Semantics

`evidence_ledger.csv` is a claim-to-source audit trail. Each row records the
claim being evaluated, the source and locator checked, a short excerpt or
negative-search result, the evidence strength, and the limitations that govern
interpretation.

The `status` value `verified` has a deliberately narrow meaning: the project
checked the cited source, locator, and excerpt. It does **not** mean that the
underlying claim, sample identity, chain of custody, laboratory result,
commercial representation, provenance narrative, or causal interpretation has
been independently proven.

Read `strength` together with `limitations`. In particular:

- commercial and auction records verify what was represented, entered, scored,
  priced, or sold; they do not authenticate a genotype;
- regional agronomic evidence describes production context unless the disputed
  material itself was authenticated and studied;
- a negative database or document search records what this project did not
  locate, not proof that the evidence does not exist;
- `SL9-like` and `provisionally closest to SL09` describe a reported
  reference relationship, not an exact accession assignment or introduction
  history; and
- an adverse result for one properly sampled tree cannot be generalized to a
  farm, cooperative, region, retail lot, or market category without a sampling
  design that supports that inference.