Hypericum richeri (Nomenclature)
Perennial herb 0.1–0.5 m, erect or decumbent from creeping and rooting base, with stems up to c. 6, unbranched below inflorescence. Stems shallowly 4–2-lined, eglandular; internodes 12–60 mm, shorter than to exceeding leaves. Leaves sessile, sometimes amplexicaul, erect to usually spreading; lamina 10–55 × 5–21 mm, lanceolate to elliptic or broadly ovate, paler beneath to wholly glaucous, chartaceous, sometimes rather thickly so; apex acute to rounded, margin entire, base rounded to shallowly cordate or cuneate; venation: 3–4 main laterals from lower 2/5 to half of midrib, branching, with dense tertiary reticulation; laminar glands absent; marginal glands black, irregular to rather dense. Inflorescence 1–18-flowered, from 2–3(–4) nodes, the upper node often short, very rarely with 1–2 pairs of flowering branches below, the whole obconic to corymbiform; pedicels 2.5–5 mm; bracts linear to subulate, black-glandular-ciliate to -fimbriate, base subauriculate-fimbriate. Flowers 20–35(–45) mm in diam., stellate; buds ellipsoid, obtuse to acute. Sepals 5, equal or rarely unequal, (4–)5–8 × 1.5–3 mm, narrowly to rather broadly elliptic, acuminate to rounded, glandular-ciliate to -fimbriate or occasionally subentire to entire, erect in fruit; veins (3–)5–7, branching and reticulating, becoming prominent in fruit; laminar glands all black, punctiform to shortly striiform; marginal glands black, subsessile or usually on denticles, cilia or fimbriae. Petals 5, bright or usually pale yellow, not tinged red, 10–25 × 5–8 mm, c. 2.5–3 × sepals, oblanceolate, rounded; laminar glands black, punctiform to striiform or shortly linear, dispersed; marginal glands black, distal, on cilia. Stamens c. 60–80, longest 6–11(– 13) mm, c. 0.5 × petals. Ovary (2.5–)3–5 × 2–3(–4) mm, ovoid-pyramidal to broadly ovoid; styles 4–6 mm, 1–1.5 × ovary. Capsule 6–9 × 4–7 mm, ovoid-pyramidal to broadly ovoid; valves with black and sometimes also pale glandular vesicles that, in subspp. grisebachii and richeri, are occasionally shortly elongate. Seeds stramineous, 1.2 mm; testa ribbed-foveolate.
2n = 14 (Reynaud, 1975); n = 7 (Favarger, 1959); both for 11b. subsp. richeri.
Montane woods and meadows on limestone or granitic soils; 1000–2200 m (Pyrenees, Alps and Appenines, c. 400–2450 m (Balkans and Carpathians).
Slovenia south to northern Albania and western Bulgaria and east along the Carpathians (Romania, Ukraine); Jura, western Alps and Appenines (Switzerland, France, Italy); Pyrenees and Cantabrian Mts. (France, Spain). The record for the Crimea is erroneous (Vul’f, 1953: 111).
Hypericum richeri is most closely related to 2. H. spruneri, differing from it especially in the broader leaves with more densely reticulate venation and the broader ovary and capsule with black vesicular glands. These two species both occur in the northern Adriatic region but at different altitudes, H. spruneri lowland (Croatia - Pula) and H. richeri montane (Slovenia).
Hypericum richeri sensu lato has usually been treated as three species: H. richeri Vill. sensu stricto (western Alps, Jura, Appenines), H. burseri (DC.) Spach (Pyrenees, Cantabria) and H. alpigenum Kit. (Balkans, Carpathians). The morphological variation, however, is almost continuous, diverging from the Slovenian/Croatian population of H. alpigenum (most similar to H. spruneri) westward through H. richeri to H. burseri and south and eastward to the Ukrainian Carpathian population of H. alpigenum. I therefore decided to treat these taxa as subspecies in Flora Europaea (Robson, 1968); and a reconsideration of their relationships now has confirmed my decision.