甘肃黄鹌菜 gan su huang an cai

Crepis parva (Babcock & Stebbins) Handel-Mazzetti; Pseudoyoungia conjunctiva (Babcock & Stebbins) D. Maity & Maiti; P. parva (Babcock & Stebbins) D. Maity & Maiti; Tibetoseris conjunctiva (Babcock & Stebbins) Sennikov; T. parva (Babcock & Stebbins) Sennikov; Youngia parva Babcock & Stebbins.

Herbs 4-12 cm tall, perennial, rosulate. Taproot and short woody caudex with residues of old leaf bases. Stem solitary, erect, branched apically or from near base, densely tomentose but glabrescent with age, distantly leafy. Rosette leaves oblanceolate, 1.5-6 × 0.5-1.2 cm, both faces tomentulose to glabrescent, base attenuate into a petiole-like portion and semiamplexicaul, margin sinuately to runcinately dentate and/or runcinately pinnatifid, apex obtuse to acute; lobes (if present) narrowly triangular, apex acute to acuminate. Stem leaves none or few, similar to rosette leaves but smaller, with narrower lobes, and apex acuminate. Synflorescence laxly corymbiform, with 4-8 capitula. Capitula with 13-18 florets; peduncle 1-6 cm, slender, densely tomentose. Involucre cylindric to campanulate, 1-1.1 cm. Phyllaries dark to blackish green, ciliate otherwise abaxially glabrous, apex acute; outer phyllaries lanceolate to linear-lanceolate, longest 1/3-1/2(-2/3) as long as inner ones; inner phyllaries 10-12, adaxially densely pubescent with appressed shiny hairs. Anther tube apically or entirely greenish. Style yellow upon drying. Achene not seen when mature. Pappus white, ca. 7 mm. Fl. Jul-Aug.

● Grassy slopes; 3800-4500 m. SW Gansu, N Sichuan.

Youngia conjunctiva and Y. parva, both only known from the type collections and simultaneously described by Babcock and Stebbins (Publ. Carnegie Inst. Washington 484: 35, 37. 1937), are strikingly similar in all features, except minor differences in the habit, and are from the same larger region adjacent to that of the supposed next relatives. The type of Y. parva has an apically branching stem of 2-3 cm, that of Y. conjunctiva one of 8-10 cm; their architecture, however, is basically identical. For these reasons it appears not justified to treat them as separate species, and they are here considered as conspecific. Doubts about their distinctness had already been expressed by Sennikov and I. D. Illarionova (Komarovia 5: 91. 2008). Additional collections and further studies of this apparently rare species would be desirable. Its systematic position in Youngia also needs confirmation.