pygmy-flower rock-jasmine

Androsace septentrionalis is a highly variable plant from hardly noticeable to substantial in size, but does not form a mat. Plants can be annuals or biennials with all their basal leaves in a single rosette. The leaves are attached by a very short petiole or directly without a leaf stem. They measure 5 to 35 millimeters long with a width of 3 to 10 mm and can be hairless or hairy, but usually ciliate, fringed with hairs along the leaf edge. Leaves have a oblanceolate to spatulate shape; like a reversed spear head or a spoon shape. Plants usually have one to five scapes, leafless floral stems, but can occasionally have as many as 10. They typically measure 1 to 10 centimeters long, but will sometime reach 30 cm. Each inflorescence has as few as five or as many as 30 flowers. The flowers are small, measuring just 4–6 mm across, and with white or pink petals. The fruit is a capsule measuring 3 to 5 mm. Inside there are numerous seeds each 0.5 to 1 mm.

Androsace septentrionalis is a very widely distributed species that is native to North America, Europe, and temperate Asia. In Europe it is native as far west as France, but is not found in the Low Countries or the British Isles. In Central Europe it grows widely, but is not found in Hungary. To the south it is also found in Italy and Romania. To the north it is part of the flora of Denmark and the Scandinavian Peninsula and Finland. It grows in every part of Eastern Europe except for on the Crimean Peninsula. It reaches as far south as Georgia and neighboring Armenia. In western Asia it is somewhat wide spread growing in western Siberia, Altai Krai, and Yakutia, as well as to 72° N in the Novaya Zemlya archipelago. In Central Asia it is native to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and even Tajikistan. Southwards it crosses over into northern Pakistan and the northwestern part of India in the Western Himalayas. In China it grows in the northern provinces of Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Hebei as well as the country of Mongolia. At the eastern side of Asia it grows throughout the Russian Far East and also in Korea. The North American population of the species is native to all the far north from Alaska to Greenland. It grows throughout Canada as far east as Quebec and formerly grew in Newfoundland but is locally extinct there. …