Primula firmipes Balf.f. & Forrest, Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinburgh 13: 10. 1920.
Section Sikkimensis
Link to Flora of China description
Type specimen: Forrest 18899 resides at Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (specimen E00024349) and US National Herbarium (specimen US00116476).
P. deleiensis (syn): Kingdon Ward, Ann. Bot. 1930, xliv. 124. Type specimen: Kingdon Ward 8381 resides at KEW (specimen K000750211) and Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (specimen E00024346).
P. flexilipes (syn): Balf.f. & Forrest, Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinburgh 13: 10. 1920. Type specimen: Forrest 18874 resides at Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (specimens E00024347, E00024348) and the Smithsonian (specimen 00116477) and Harvard (specimen 00073540).
P. firmipes subsp. flexilipes (Balf.f. & Forrest) (syn): W.W.Sm. & Forrest, Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinburgh. 16: 39. 1928.
P. rubra (nec Gmelin, nec Dörfl. , nec [Honck.] ) (syn): Kingdon Ward, Ann. Bot. 1930, xliv. 124. Type specimen: Kingdon Ward 8380 resides as below. Name invalid by prior use, replaced with P. erythra.
P. erythra (syn): H.R.Fletcher, Trans. & Proc. Bot. Soc. Edinb. xxxiii. 440 (1943). Type specimen: Kingdon Ward 8380 resides at KEW (specimens K000750448, K000750408) and Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (specimen E00024719). Red flowered.
P. firmipes var. erytha (H.R.Fletcher) (syn): A.J.Richards, Primula 209 (1993).
P. subansirica (syn): G.D.Pal, J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 82(3): 617. 1986. Type specimen: G.D.Pal 78219 resides at Calcutta and Arunachal Pradesh. Hairy scaped.
P. firmipes subsp. subansirica (G.D.Pal) (syn): S.K.Basak & Maiti, Gen. Primula India 365. 2014.
Epithet: Named for ?
Distribution: Tibet (Xizang), Yunnan, Myanmar, Arunachal Pradesh.
Primula firmipes was initially collected by George Forrest on the Salween/Kiu-chiang divide. P. flexilipes was collected at the same location and P. deleiensis was collected less than 200 kms to the west in the Delei valley. Both are minor variations of P. firmipes. P. erytha was collected with P. deleiensis but is red flowered instead of yellow. The recent book "The Genus Primula L. in India" by Basak, Maiti and Hajra place P. subansirica as a subspecies of P. firmipes. This species is little known, and superficially resembles P. firmipes but differs in that the plant is covered in rusty red hairs.
Primula firmipes has ovate to ovate-oblong or suborbicula leaves, rounded at the apex, with a shallowly cordate base and a crenate-dentate margin. In this it resembles P. florindae but the leaves are much smaller being 1-7 x 1-5cm. The corolla is similar to P. alpicola and a pale yellow in color.
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