Saxifraga pulvinaria H. Sm.

Found in the Baltistan and Kaghan areas from 4300-4430 m. Grows on rocks forming almost smooth cushion-like tufts and mats.

Stems densely tufted, decumbent, 3-6 cm long. Leaves 2 mm long, densely imbricate, broadly oblong, apex obtuse, flattened with a white perforation, keeled below. Flowers white, terminal, solitary, sessile. Sepals 1.5 mum long, ovate, obtuse, glandular-ciliate. Petals 3-4 mm long, limb suborbicular, base unguiculate, margin undulate, sometimes lobed. Filaments c. as long as the sepals. Style short. Capsule broadly ovoid.

Plants many branched, 4.5-6 cm tall, with crowded shoots forming cushions. Flowering stem embedded among rosette leaves and not visible, 1.4-1.9 mm, glabrous. Shoot leaves imbricate, aggregated into a rosette, narrowly elliptic, ca. 3.3 × 1.4 mm, leathery, both surfaces glabrous, chalk gland 1, margin cartilaginous ciliate, apex acute, glabrous. Cauline leaves 3 or 4, linear-oblong, 3.5-4 × 0.8-1 mm, both surfaces glabrous, chalk gland 1, margin cartilaginous ciliate, apex acute, glabrous. Flower solitary; bract suboblong, ca. 2.8 × 0.9 mm, both surfaces glabrous, margin glandular ciliate, apex acute; pedicel ca. 0.3 mm. Sepals erect, subtriangular-ovate to broadly ovate, 1.6-2 × ca. 1.4 mm, leathery, both surfaces glabrous, veins 3, confluent at apex, margin glandular ciliate, apex obtuse or acute, glabrous. Petals white, obovate or oblanceolate to oblong, 3.5-5.3 × (1.5-)2-3 mm, 5- or 6-veined, base gradually narrowed into a claw, apex retuse or obtuse. Stamens ca. 2.2 mm. Ovary subinferior, ca. 2 mm, with an annular nectary disc; styles ca. 1.5 mm. Fl. Jun-Jul.

Himalaya (Kashmir to Nepal).

Distribution: Alpine Himalayas (Sikkim to Kashmir).

SW Xinjiang (Taxkorgan Tajik Zizhixian), SW Xizang (Burang Xian), NW Yunnan (Gongshan Drung-Nu Zu Zizhixian, Zhongdian Xian) [Bhutan, India, Kashmir, Nepal, Sikkim].

3800-5800 m

Fl.Per.: June-July.

Rock crevices; 3900-5200 m.

Saxifraga imbricata Royle, Ill. Bot. Himal. Mts. 1: 226. 1835, not Lamarck (1779), nor Bertoloni (1830).