Panarctic Flora

Browse

290102a Allium schoenoprasum northern race

Distribution

Northern Fennoscandia: Frequent
Kanin - Pechora: Frequent
Polar Ural - Novaya Zemlya: Scattered
Yamal - Gydan: Rare
Taimyr - Severnaya Zemlya: Scattered
Anabar - Onenyo: Rare
Kharaulakh: Scattered
Yana - Kolyma: Rare
West Chukotka: Scattered
South Chukotka: Scattered
East Chukotka: Rare
Western Alaska: Scattered
Northern Alaska - Yukon: Rare
Central Canada: Rare
Hudson Bay - Labrador: Rare
Southern Arcti Tundra: Scattered
Shrub Tundra: Frequent
Bordering boreal or alpine areas: Frequent

GBIF

2n= 16 (2x). - Europe (N), Russia (N), Siberia (N), Far East (N), Alaska, Canada. - Very numerous reports from all part areas, many of them for "sibiricum".

Geography: European (N) - Asian (N) - amphi-Beringian - North American (N): NOR RUS SIB RFE ALA CAN.

Notes: Northern plants of Allium schoenoprasum s. lat. are often considered a race or species apart and has been named "sibiricum". This name is problematic. Linnaeus described A. sibiricum as white-flowered and as different from the arctic-subarctic plant now commonly named as such. There is no original material available for typification of the "sibiricum" name that fits with its current usage. If one prefers to treat the northern plants as a race apart from A. schoenoprasum s. str., this race must be described and named.

In Fennoscandia, the northern subspecies is distinguished from A. schoenoprasum s. str. by several presumed independently inherited characters, e.g., leaves 2-6 mm broad and extending up the stem vs. ca. 1.5 mm broad and limited to the basal parts of the stem, tepals ca. 15 mm vs. 7-10 mm, and capsule with obtuse vs. acute angles. There is an ecological difference, too. Allium schoenoprasum s. str. is mainly growing on very dry, shallow soil. The northern subspecies is more mesic, growing in meadows and meadow forests, and also sometimes in mires. The two taxa are allopatric in this region. The plants in arctic parts of Siberia, Chukotka, and northwestern North America correspond closely morphologically to the northern subspecies. All native arctic and near-arctic plants seem to belong within one race of A. schoenoprasum s. lat. The discontinuity in the variation pattern reported from northwestern Europe is, however, not reported from more temperate parts of Russia, and Hultén (1962) suggested that deviating plants are found also in eastern North America.

Higher Taxa