Taraxacum scanicum Dahlst. group (section Erythrosperma) in Poland: chorology and seed and pollen morphology of the microspecies

Abstract

The genus Taraxacum is taxonomically complicated due to apomixis. Therefore, there are significant differences in knowledge of regional Taraxacum-Floras among European countries. Similarly, some taxa are well characterised with well-known distribution, whereas some ones are known e.g. from a single locality. Taraxacum scanicum of section Erythrosperma is one of the most common microspecies of this section in Europe. Recently, this taxon was split into three microspecies. In this study we map the distribution of three described taxa of this group in Poland, i.e. T. scanicum s.s., T. prunicolor and T. cristatum. The survey showed that T. scanicum has a similar distribution as T. prunicolor in Poland. This is in contrast with the hitherto known distribution of both taxa. T. cristatum was found at a single locality that is quite distant from the distribution in southern central Europe. We also provide with new morphological characteristics of achenes and pollen for T. scanicum s.s. and T. prunicolor.