48 SUB-ALPINE PLANTS 



Black Forest, Vosges, Jura, Pyrenees, and almost all mountainous 

 Europe, including Southern Scandinavia ; Northern Asia. 



Thalictrum minus L. 



A most variable species ; in dry limestone soils usually only 

 about a foot high, of a glaucous colour or slightly downy ; in moist 

 situations it is larger and greener, with stems often 3 feet high, 

 fiexuous, furrowed, glaucous, glabrous or pubescent-glandular. 

 Leaves large, with leaflets glaucous below and rather large. Flowers 

 yellow, pendent, in branched leafy panicles, flower-stalks slender. 

 Carpels oval, with longitudinal ribs. 



Rocky places in the hills, chestnut groves and fields, especially 

 in the sub-alpine district. June and July. Well worth cultivating 

 for its beautiful foliage, resembling robust and wiry Maidenhair fern. 



Distribution. — Europe, Russian Asia, Africa, Alaska (British). 



Thalictrum alpinum L. Alpine Meadow-rue. 



Root slender, creeping. Stem 2-4 inches high, almost naked, 

 simple. Leaves radical, glabrous ; leaflets oboval, 3-cleft, crenate, 

 gre3dsh green. Flowers in a simple terminal raceme, greenish yeUow, 

 pendent ; flower-stalks recurved. The smallest of the genus. 



Moist Alpine and sub-alpine pastures, rare ; 3300-8000 feet. 

 June to August. 



Distribution. — Eastern, Central and Western Alps ; in Switzer- 

 land only in Grisons ; Eastern and Central Pyrenees, Caucasus, 

 Northern Europe and Asia (British). 



In Norway it reaches about 3400 feet. 



Thalictrum fcetidum L. 



Rhizome short. Stem 4-12 inches high, fiexuous, feebly striated, 

 glandular pubescent, and foetid hke the whole plant. Leaves as 

 broad as long, somewhat triangular ; leaflets small, toothed, 

 usually densely pubescent, rarely glabrous ; foliage Uke Maidenhair 

 fern except in colour. Flowers yellow, pendent, in a much-branched 

 panicle. Carpels rounded at the base, oval-orbicular with prominent 

 ribs. Another polymorphic species found in rocky places among the 

 mountains up to 8000 feet. June to Ajigust. It is very common 

 about Zinal. 



Distribution. — Alps of Central Europe, Eastern Pyrenees, Central 

 and Northern Asia. 



Thalictrum tuberosum L. 



Roots tuberous, spindle-shaped. Plant distinguished from all 

 other species of Thalictrum by its flowers having 4 or rarely 5 

 large yellowish white sepals. 



Dry, rocky places up to 4000 feet in the Pyrenees, Corbieres and 

 Spain. 



The European species of Thalictrum are easily naturalised in 



