Primula veris

Plants 8-30 cm, herbaceous; rhizomes thick, short; rosettes sometimes clumped, vegetative parts efarinose but often pubescent. Leaves not aromatic, indistinctly or abruptly petiolate; petiole winged; blade with deep reticulate veins abaxially, ovate to ovate-oblong, 5-20 × 2-6 cm, thin, membranaceous in age, margins coarsely toothed, apex acute to obtuse, surfaces pubescent, hairs simple. Inflorescences 5-16-flowered; involucral bracts plane, unequal. Pedicels erect to drooping, moderately thick, 3-20 mm, length 1-3 times bracts, flexuous. Flowers heterostylous; calyx pale green, broadly campanulate, 0.8-2 cm; corolla yellow, with orange spots at base of lobes, tube 8-20 mm, length to 1 times calyx, eglandular, limb 8-28 mm diam., lobes 8-14 mm, apex slightly emarginate to distinctly notched. Capsules ovoid, length to 1 times calyx. Seeds without flanged edges, minutely vesiculate. 2n = 22 (Europe).

Flowering spring. Meadows and pastures, persisting around old gardens and homesteads, apparently substantially spreading and naturalized; 0-1000 m; introduced; B.C., N.B., Nfld. and Labr. (Nfld.), N.S., Ont., Que.; Conn., Maine, Mass., Mich., N.Y.; Europe.

Primula veris shows exceptional morphological variation in Europe, with multiple specific and infraspecific names. It is a popular garden plant both here and in Europe; horticultural varieties abound and are almost certainly represented among the records from North America.

With yellow fls and somewhat inflated cal, occasionally escapes in the n. part of our range.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

©The New York Botanical Garden. All rights reserved. Used by permission.