560102-05 The Linum perenne aggregate L. boreale, L. komarovii, L. lewisii, L. taymirense
Geography: Disjunct circumboreal.
Notes: Egorova and Elven: The Linum perenne group includes several disjunct taxa and can be interpreted in various ways: one widely distributed species with races, one Eurasian (L. boreale) and one North American species (L. lewisii), or several species. Ockendon (1967, 1968) and Ockendon and Walters (1968) treated the morphological variation and taxonomy in Europe, Peschkova (1996b) that in Siberia, and Harris (1968) and Mosquin (1971) studied cytology and variation in North America. The variation in the group is at different levels, justifying several ranks. We have chosen a solution based on Mosquin (1971) for North America, Peschkova (1996b) for Siberia, and Egorova for all of Russia. Linum perenne s. str. is then considered restricted to Europe and does not approach the Arctic. We do not know whether the differences between the three proposed Eurasian species are more pronounced than between the two North American subspecies but we suspect not.
Higher Taxa
- Linum [5601,genus]