胎生紫堇 tai sheng zi jin

Herbs, perennial, glaucous, 40-80 cm tall, glabrous. Rhizome with fleshy imbricate scales, terminating in prominent bulblike bud. Stems slender, not branched or with 1 branch from upper leaf, with 4 or 5 scattered leaves. Petioles of radical leaves 8-20 cm, petioles of lower cauline leaves 4-10 cm, petioles of upper leaves ca. 1 cm; blade glaucous abaxially, green or glaucous around midveins of leaflets adaxially, ovate-triangular, 4-6 × 4-6 cm, bi- to tripinnate; pinnae petiolulate; pinnules shortly petiolulate, ultimate leaflets ovate to oblong-ovate, crenate-dentate to pinnatifid; lobules or teeth rounded, slightly mucronulate. Upper cauline leaves progressively smaller upward, with prominent acute (dark?) bulbils 8-19 × 3-5 mm in axils of middle and upper leaves; bulbils sometimes sprouting while still attached. Raceme 4-8 cm in flower, at fruiting to 15 cm, 10-15-flowered; bracts 4-8 mm, shortly stalked, blade deeply biternatisect; upper bracts smaller and less divided. Pedicel 3-6 mm, slightly longer in fruit. Sepals 1-1.5 × ca. 1 mm, dentate, pointed. Corolla purple, straight; outer petals without crest, narrow, acuminate to sharp tip; upper petal 22-25 mm; spur straight, narrow, attenuate to tip, 15-18 mm; nectary ca. 1/4 as long as spur; lower petal narrow, apically widened to elliptic acuminate limb; inner petals ca. 10 mm. Stigma rounded, with 8 marginal papillae and geminate papillae on basal lobes. Fruit and seeds unknown, probably often not produced. Fl. and fr. Apr-Jun.

● Humid forests and bushlands; (1200-)1400-2900 m. W Sichuan.