Small white flowered violet. Flowers measured to 11 mm diameter, usually 10 mm or less in diameter. Flowers white with the spur petal stongly purple lined. Lateral petals hairless or only with a few hairs. Leaf blades hairless. Leaves orbicular to cordate, leaves small, usually less than 2.5 cm in length and width, crenate, blunt-tipped. Scapes elongate, to 11 cm long, often to 5 cm above the leaves. All stems from a single rootstalk, no leafy stems. Spur to 3 mm long.
Flowers with a very slight fragrance. Begins flowering about 1st of June.
This plant is quite similar to Viola blanda which flowers at the same time. However that plant has larger flowers (to 13 mm diameter), larger leaves (to 4 cm long, 3.5 cm wide), puberelent leaf undersides, and scapes that are generally at or below the level of its leaves.
Taxonomic key to Saskatchewan's violets.
Habitat is forest wetlands. This plant is very rare in Saskatchewan, listed as an S1 by the Saskatchewan Conservation Data Centre.
Above photos taken June 13th and 15th wet hummocks with Ostrich Ferns in spruce woods Hudson Bay district SK 425 km north east of Regina, SK, June 19th and July 2nd, wet grassy hummocks in alder thicket, shore of small lake, Porcupine Hills, about 500 km north east of our home in Regina, SK.