| Poa pratensis subsp. alpigena (Lindm.) Hiitonen | |
| Publ. & Syn. | ?Poa rigens Hartm., Handb. Skand. Fl.: 448 (1820). Type: Sweden: Lule lappmark, Kvikkjokk, leg. L.L. Læstadius. See notes. - ?Poa pratensis subsp. rigens (Hartm.) Tzvelev, Novosti Sist. Vyssh. Rast. 9: 47 (1972). |
| Notes | Poa alpigena is sometimes erroneously stated to have been described from "Spitzbergen, Liefdebay". The mistake is probably caused by subsp. colpodea being described from the Liefdefjord area in Svalbard. Tzvelev (PAF proposal) recognized two taxa within the North American and northwestern European concept of subsp. alpigena: subsp. alpigena s. str. and subsp. rigens. Subspecies rigens was originally described as similar to subsp. irrigata (and entered as a synonym of that name by Soreng et al. 2003 but as a synonym of subsp. alpigena by Soreng 2007). Tzvelev (PAF proposal) suggested it to be a subspecies of P. alpigena and as disjunct: northern Fennoscandia (rare), Kanin-Pechora (rare), West Chukotka (rare), and western Greenland (rare). There are numerous morphologically separable 'biotypes' within subsp. alpigena but we have not been able (in the Nordic area) to group them into two main races: subsp. alpigena and subsp. rigens. We therefore believe that we must be pragmatic and accept a wide circumscription of this subspecies, including apomictic biotypes that may be comparatively little related. However, Tzvelev (in comment) later stated P. rigens to be rather different and more closely related to the Beringian P. sublanata (see below). |
| Chromosomes | 28-127 (4x-ca. 18x). - Europe (N), Russia (N), Far East (N), Alaska, Canada. - Numerous reports. Flovik (1938) reported 2n = 42+4ff and 44 for bulbil-reproducing plants (might be "colpodea") and 2n = ca. 77 and 84 for seed-reproducing plants from Svalbard. |
| Geography | Circumboreal-polar: ICE NOR RUS SIB RFE ALA CAN GRL. |
| Distribution | N = F A = R AN = f B = F AO = f C = F GW = f D = F Ic = f E = F CC = s WI = f YG = f HL = f FN = f EP = r CE = f CS = f UN = f YK = f AW = f GE = f Kh = f SF = f CW = f Tm = f KP = f [ key ] |
| Parent taxon | Poa pratensis L. |
| PAF ID | 342609d |