Panarctic Flora

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860706 Erigeron koraginensis (Kom.) Botsch.

Distribution

Polar Ural - Novaya Zemlya: Rare
Taimyr - Severnaya Zemlya: Presence uncertain
Anabar - Onenyo: Rare
Kharaulakh: Scattered
West Chukotka: Scattered
Wrangel Island: Frequent
South Chukotka: Rare
East Chukotka: Rare
Mid Arctic Tundra: Scattered
Southern Arcti Tundra: Scattered
Shrub Tundra: Scattered
Bordering boreal or alpine areas: Scattered

2n= 18 (2x). - Far East (N). - At least five reports, four for E. komarovii, one for E. koraginensis.

Geography: Asian (N) & Asian Beringian: RUS SIB RFE.

Notes: Murray and Elven: Petrovsky (1987b) synonymized Erigeron muirii, E. koraginensis, and E. komarovii under the first-mentioned name and reported it from three quite distant parts of northern Russia: Polar Ural, the lower Lena River area, and from all over the Russian Far East from the Anyui Mountains east to East Chukotka, south to northern Kamtchatka and north to Wrangel Island. His merger was based on Hultén's (1968a, 1968b) description of E. muirii, which in its turn was based on a mixture of E. muirii s. str. from the Brooks Range and E. porsildii from the Arctic Coast. Hultén's concept was, accordingly, not very specific. Petrovsky (in comment) now excludes E. muirii from northeastern Asia. In addition, Petrovsky (1987b) recognized E. grandiflorus s. lat. (including Hultén's subsp. grandiflorus and Porsild's subsp. arcticus) from a few mountain sites along the Koryak coast and in northeastern Kamtchatka. The material we have seen from northern and northeastern Asia is not extensive enough to decide whether one or more species are present. We here accept only one but suspect that there may be more.

Korobkov (PAF proposal) accepted the name E. komarovii Botsch. 1954 with E. koraginensis (Kom.) Botsch. 1954 (based on Aster koraginensis Kom. 1930) as synonym. Nesom and Murray (2005) did the same. If the two names are synonyms, E. koraginensis must have priority (Barkalov 1992) and we have entered it as such. The two names are based on types from the same general area: Kamtchatka and surroundings. Here and farther south occur additional, deviating plants, partly going by different names. The names E. thunbergii A. Gray and E. dubius (Thunb.) Makino are applied to Japanese plants differing much from the arctic ones and also from Cordilleran E. grandiflorus. The name E. consanguineus (Ledeb.) Novopokr. 1938, non Cabrera 1937 based on [Aster consanguineus Ledeb., Fl. Ross. 2, 2: 473 (1845)], has been much applied to the Kamtchatkan plants, but this name is a later homonym and is to be replaced by E. thunbergii (Barkalov 1992). Hultén (1930) considered E. thunbergii synonymous with E. dubius. These plants seem to be closer to the Japanese than to the arctic ones (as indicated also by Hultén 1930). If the Kamtchatkan name E. komarovii (of which we have not seen any type) connects to these Kamtchatkan plants, the name E. koraginensis fits even better to the arctic plants. The type of E. koraginensis clearly connects, in our opinion, to the arctic plants.

Higher Taxa