Tulipa tschimganica Botschantz.

Tulipa × tschimganica Botschantz., Bot. Mater. Gerb. Inst. Bot. Akad. Nauk Uzbeksk. SSR. 16: 10 (1961). Fig. 44 Type. Uzbekistan • Grown in the Botanical Garden of the Academy of Sciences of Uzbek SSR from bulbs collected by Z. P. Botschantzeva in 1959 in the gorge in piedmonts of Greater Chimgan, on fine earth among stones, Botschantzeva 99 (holotype TASH 000526!). General distribution. Kazakhstan, Kirgizstan, and Uzbekistan. Distribution in Kazakhstan and habitat. Western Tian Shan. This species grows on rubbly and stony slopes in lower and middle mountain belts (1400–1700 m a. s. l.). Conservation status. Not assessed at the global level. However, this nothospecies is not protected in Kazakhstan. Phenology. Flowering in April – May; fruiting June – July. Notes. Tulipa × tschimganica was described in 1961 by Z. P. Botschantzeva from specimens grown in the Tashkent Botanical Garden from bulbs collected in Bolshoi Chimgan Gorge (Uzbekistan) (Ivashchenko and Belyalov 2019). In Kazakhstan, the species was first discovered in 2003 in the territory of the Keles Forestry, Karabausai tract (Karzhantau Ridge) along the rubbly hollows of the northwestern and north-eastern slopes at an altitude of 1600–1700 m a. s. l. (Ivashchenko et al. 2006). The origin of this species is relatively controversial; some consider it a separate species (Botschantzeva 1962; Van Raamsdonk et al. 1997; Pratov et al. 2006; Zonneveld 2009), whereas others consider it a hybrid of T. greigii and T. kaufmanniana (Vvedensky and Kovalevskaya 1971) or a hybrid of T. dubia and T. kaufmanniana (Christenhusz et al. 2013). Tojibaev (2010) and Tojibaev and Beshko (2014) previously considered this species a subspecies of T. kaufmanniana subsp. tschimganica but it was listed as a separate species later in the synopsis of the genus Tulipa (Liliaceae) in Uzbekistan (Tojibaev et al. 2022).