Silene uniflora

Silene uniflora is a perennial plant that forms a mat with stems growing outwards to between 10 and 40 cm. A plant will grow a large main root that can be a thick storage root like that of a carrot or turnip.^[2] The stems can grow along the ground or grow upwards towards their ends.^[3]

The leaves are hairless and glaucous, grey-green due to a covering of natural waxes.^[4] They have a fleshy texture and a variety of shapes including lanceolate, oblanceolate, elliptic or spatulate.^[2] The flowers white with five deeply notched petals, the five sepals fused and inflated to form a bladder.^[4] Each flower has three pistils and three stamens that are almost enclosed by the flower.^[5]

It is similar in appearance to the bladder campion (Silene vulgaris) but with flowers generally solitary.^[6]

In 1762 Carl Linnaeus named Silene amoena, a species that does not have the same description as Silene uniflora, but is regarded as a synonym of Silene uniflora subsp. uniflora.^[7] The scientific description and naming of the species as a whole was by Albrecht Wilhelm Roth in 1794. It is classified in the genus Silene which is in the family Caryophyllaceae.^[1]

Silene uniflora Silene uniflora is a maritime species growing in many European countries, but almost entirely along the coasts bordering the Atlantic Ocean and Baltic Sea.^[2] In northern Europe, it is native to the coasts of Scandinavia including Finland, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Russia as far east as the Kola Peninsula.^[13][2] It is also listed as native to Poland by POWO. It is not found in, or native to, the Baltic States or Russia on the Baltic Sea.^[1] In western Europe, it is native to the west coast of France, the northern coast of Spain, and a limited area in northern Portugal.^[13] It grows all around the shores of Ireland and the United Kingdom, and is also found in some mountainous areas near fresh water,^[6] though only rarely.^[4] Further out in the Atlantic Ocean, it is native to the Azores, the Canary Islands, Madeira, and Iceland.^[1]

It has been introduced to Germany, Argentina, and New Zealand.^[11]

It is one of the long-lived perennial plant species that establish on coastal shingle that has been stable for between five and twenty years.^[14] It also grows in the dunes and at the strandline on beaches.^[15]