Chorispora bungeana Fisch. & C. A. Mey.

Chitral plants, cited above, usually have fairly hairy habit, especially on sepals, stalks and leaf margins. Pods eaten raw or cooked as vegetable.

Chorispora tianschanica was said to differ from C. bungeana in being completely glandular and with serrate leaf margins and rounded petal apices. However, these alleged differences do not hold, and C. bungeana is highly variable throughout most of its range, especially in leaf morphology and the density of glandular papillae.

Perennial herb, usually glabrous and with a somewhat thick rootstock; flowering stem inconspicuous or suppressed with flowers directly borne on the rootstock. Radical leaves rosulate, oblanceolate, pinnatifid or sinuate-toothed, 20-50 (-60) mm long, 3-10 mm broad, stalked. Scapes I-flowered or raceme on a very short stem (embedded in leaves, rarely up to 6 cm long in fruit, 2-5-flowered). Flowers 15-20 mm across, pink-violet; pedicels (scape) up to 30 mm long in fruit. Sepals 7-8 (-10) mm long. Petals c. twice as long as the sepals, 5-7 mm broad, apex emarginate. Stamens c. 6:9 mm long; anthers c. 3 mm long. Siliquae 20-30 mm long, 1.5 mm broad, torulose or moniliform with several articulations; beak c. 5 mm long; seeds 1 mm in diameter.

Herbs perennial, scapose, with well-developed branched caudex; multicellular glandular trichomes sometimes mixed with simple ones to 2 mm. Basal leaves rosulate, persistent; petiole (1-)1.5-3(-4) cm, ciliate, expanded at base; leaf blade oblanceolate or oblong, (0.8-)1.2-4(-5) cm × 3-10(-15) mm, sparsely to densely glandular, pilose or glabrous, base cuneate or attenuate, margin pinnatipartite or pinnatisect, with up to 12, oblong or ovate lobes, or sinuate-dentate, dentate, repand, or entire, apex obtuse. Cauline leaves absent. Flowers solitary, arising from rosette. Fruiting pedicels (1-)1.5-3(-4) cm, densely glandular or subglabrous, sometimes also pilose. Sepals purplish, linear-oblong, (6-)7-9(-10) × 1-1.5 mm. Petals purple, broadly obovate or obcordate, (1.5-)1.7-2(-2.3) cm × 6-8 mm, emarginate or subrounded at apex; claw 0.9-1.2 cm. Filaments 6-10 mm; anthers narrowly oblong, 1.5-2.5 mm. Fruit linear-cylindric, 2-3 cm × 1.5-2 mm, corky, strongly torulose, with 8-12 constrictions on each side, glabrescent; style 4-7 mm. Seeds brown, oblong, 1.2-1.5 × 0.7-1 mm. Fl. Jun-Aug, fr. Jul-Sep.

Distribution: C. Asia, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Xinjiang [Afghanistan, India, Kashmir, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan].

Fl. Per.: May July.

Grasslands, open slopes; (2200-)3000-4200 m.

Chorispora exscapa Bunge ex Ledebour; C. tianschanica Z. X. An.