Gentiana verna
Gentiana verna
Ssp balcanica: Gentiyan; Ssp pontica: Hemşin gentiyanı
Perennial herbs, stems to 10 cm in flower but usually elongating in fruit. Leaves crowded at base, forming a rosette, broadly to narrowly elliptic or ovate, with somewhat papillose margin, to 20 x 8 mm; cauline 2-3 pairs, usually narrower. Flowers solitary, 5-merous. Calyx 12-22 mm, divided to 1/3 , ± winged on angles. Corolla deep blue with a white eye, lobes broadly obtuse and spreading; subsidiary lobes small and narrow.
1. Corolla 28-37 mm; rosette leaves ±narrowly elliptic, usually more than 2 ½ x as long as broad, subacute .........subsp. balcanica
1. Corolla 40-46 mm; rosette leaves ovate to elliptic, usually not more than 2 ¼ x as long as broad, ± obtuse .........subsp. pontica element. )