Silene grandiflora Franch.

This species is similar to Silene cardiopetala, but has narrower leaves and stiffer hairs on the calyx.

Silene grandiflora var. xerobatica W. W. Smith (Notes Roy. Bot. Gard. Edinburgh 11: 224. 1920) has a creeping habit, more crowded, linear leaves, shorter internodes in the inflorescence, fewer flowers, and shorter pedicels. It is perhaps best regarded as a separate species.

Silene grandiflora is cultivated as an ornamental.

Herbs perennial. Stems diffuse, 40--50 cm, branched, pubescent. Leaves lanceolate or narrowly lanceolate, 3--6 cm × 4--15 mm, both surfaces slightly coarse, sparsely villous at veins, margin ciliate, midvein prominent, base suborbicular or broadly cuneate, apex acuminate. Dichasial cymes lax and broad; flowers erect, to 2.5 cm in diam. Pedicel 4--7 cm, slender, pubescent; bracts lanceolate, herbaceous, villous. Calyx pale green or red, tubular-clavate, ca. 20 × 4 mm, umbilicate at base, sparsely pubescent, veins not prominent; calyx teeth ovate-lanceolate, ca. 2.5 mm, margin membranous, apex obtuse. Androgynophore 5--8 mm, glabrous. Petals red, 2--2.5 cm; claws narrowly oblanceolate, glabrous, auriculate; limbs obcordate, shallowly bifid, lobes suborbicular; coronal scales orbicular. Stamens exserted; filaments glabrous. Styles exserted. Capsule ovoid-globose, shorter than calyx. Seeds reniform. Fl. Jul--Aug.

Yunnan.

* Scrub grasslands; ca. 2000 m.

Melandrium grandiflorum (Franchet) Y. W. Tsui.