Tulipa biebersteiniana Schult. f.

Tulipa biebersteiniana Schult. f., Syst. Veg., ed. 15 bis [Roemer & Schultes] 7: 382 (1829). Fig. 10 Type. Russia • ‘ In hortis et vineis ad fluvium Terek inter Mosdok et Kisljar’, April, Bieberstein (not found). General distribution. Kazakhstan, Krym, North Caucasus, and Transcaucasus (Kutlunina et al. 2013). Distribution in Kazakhstan and habitat. Aktobe, Mugojary, Aral region, Western Upland, Ulytau, Syrt, Tobol-Ishim, Bukeev, Turgay, and Caspian region. Conservation status. The IUCN conservation status of this species requires assessment. It is included in the red book of Kazakhstan (CategoryIII). Phenology. Flowering in March – April; fruiting in May – June. Notes. Tulipa biebersteiniana was described in 1829 by J. H. Schultes from specimens from the North Caucasus (between Mozdok and Kizlyar). The species was named in honor of Russian botanist F. K. Biberstein-Marshall (Ivashchenko and Belyalov 2019). Some taxonomists classified T. biebersteiniana and T. patens as synonyms of the widespread European T. sylvestris subsp. australis (Christenhusz et al. 2013; Everett et al. 2013). However, according to Zonneveld (2009), the difference in genome size between T. biebersteiniana (56.7 pg) and T. sylvestris (62.3 pg) may differentiate T. biebersteiniana. In 2013, Perezhogin (2013) described a new species, T. turgaica Perezhogin, similar to T. biebersteiniana and grows in arid conditions. It was suggested that T. biebersteiniana, should form its own subgenus based on hierarchical cluster analysis of genetic profiles of taxa conducted on Iranian tulips using AFLPs (Asgari et al. 2020). However, this hypothesis requires further investigation. Wilson (2023) included T. biebersteiniana on the list of tulips, which may require reinstatement if evidence confirms their uniqueness.