741603 Pyrola minor L.
- L., Sp. Pl.: 396 (1753). Lectotype (LINN): Europe. Herb. Linn. 568.3 (Dorr and Barrie 1993: 178).
2n=
46 (2x). - Europe, Canada. - Numerous reports, mainly probably for P. minor s. str.
Geography: Circumboreal-polar.
Notes: Yurtsev: Low-grown arctic(-alpine) plants with compact racemes of few, white to reddish flowers are referred to var. conferta.
Elven: Also the Pyrola specialist G. Knaben (in comment) suspected an arctic(-alpine) race within P. minor but died before she could investigate the matter further.
Elven and Murray: We have inspected material from northern Eurasia, North America, and Greenland and find support for Yurtsev's suggestion of two races in P. minor. Temperate-boreal European and western Siberian plants (P. minor s. str.) are generally larger, with numerous flowers with no distinct pink-red colour, and the scaly upper stem leaves narrowly lanceolate and mostly 1-veined. The northern European alpine and arctic plants, all those seen from eastern Asia, western North America, and Greenland, and nearly all from eastern North America, are mostly smaller, with less numerous flowers with mostly a strong pink-red colour, and upper stem leaves broadly lanceolate to ovate with several veins. The stem leaf difference is distinctive. These plants conform to the proposed var. conferta. Other characters (leaf dentation, sepal shape etc.) do not seem to differentiate. It is probable that only var. conferta reaches the Arctic.
A few plants we have seen from non-arctic eastern Canada conform better to European P. minor s. str. than to var. conferta. A larger material must be surveyed before presence of P. minor s. str. in North America can be confirmed.
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Source: BerndH at Wikispecies
