Herbs 0.5–4 dm. Peduncles 5–20 cm. Flowers often 1 per primary stem, occasionally 2–5; calyx 13–25 mm, keels minutely granular-scabridulous near base or nearly smooth; corolla deep blue or rarely pale blue to white, 18–40 mm, lobes oblong-obovate, 10–20 × (3–)5–13 mm, margins with sparse lateral fringes to 2 mm, merely erose or shallowly dentate, with teeth less than 2 mm, distally and around the apex; ovary at flowering subsessile or with a short, thick gynophore much shorter than body. 2n = 78.

Phenology: Flowering summer–early fall.
Habitat: Wet meadows, river­banks, margins of sloughs, fens, beach ridges, lake­shores, brackish meadows.
Elevation: 0–1900 m.

Distribution

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• Legacy Map

Alta., B.C., Man., N.W.T., Ont., Que., Sask., Minn., Mont., N.Dak., S.Dak.

Discussion

A report of subsp. macounii from Nebraska is erro­neous, having been based on a specimen actually from North Dakota (studies for this flora). At least one report of this taxon from the southern part of the Northwest Territories is correct, but most specimens from the Northwest Territories so identified have been reidenti­fied as Gentianopsis detonsa subsp. raupii in studies for this flora.

A disjunct population in brackish meadows along the estuary of the Bonaventure River, Gaspé Peninsula, Quebec, has been called Gentiana gaspensis but appears to constitute only a relatively uniform population, the morphology of which falls within the range of variation exhibited by plants called Gentianopsis virgata subsp. macounii (H. A. Gleason 1952, as Gentiana tonsa; J. M. Gillett 1957; A. Dutilly et al. 1958).

Subspecies macounii and subsp. virgata intergrade in Minnesota, southern Manitoba, and occasionally as far west as southern Saskatchewan.

Selected References

None.

Lower Taxa

None.