Plant Wiki

The open plant encyclopedia

Know any plant.
Grow it well.

Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.

  • 13,000+plants with full pages
  • 365,000+plant species worldwide
  • 220+countries covered

Common in

See all

The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.

What do you want to do?

Popular plants

Browse all plants

See them in 3D

All plants in 3D

Browse plants

Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.

Plant Wiki › Browse plants

Moonlight Primrose

Primula alpicola

Moonlight Primrose
Photo: peganum, CC BY-SA 2.0

Primula alpicola, the moonlight primrose, is a perennial primula from the high mountains of Bhutan and southeastern Tibet, grown for its bell-shaped flowers in white, cream, yellow or purple. It needs cool, moist conditions and dislikes heat.

Family
Primulaceae (Primul family)
Grows as
Perennial
Light
Part shade
Water
Keep the soil evenly moist during the growing season but never waterlogged; water from below or at the base.
Soil
Humus-rich, moisture-retentive but free-draining soil, slightly acidic to neutral.
Temperature
10–20 °C; hardy to about -20 °C, but shelter from hot, dry summer conditions.
How easy
Moderate
Native range
Bhutan to SE. Tibet
Climate
subalpine or subarctic

About

Primula alpicola, the moonlight primrose, is a species of Primula native to Bhutan and southeastern Tibet, where it grows in vast numbers along the Tsangpo valley alongside Primula florindae. Their habitats hardly ever overlap; P. florindae prefers wetter soils close to rivers, giving way to P. alpicola on drier sites.

It was first collected for western horticulture in 1926 by Frank Kingdon-Ward, and was described as a variety of Primula microdonta by William Wright Smith, but later raised to a distinct species by Otto Stapf.

Other Primula plants

Auricula · Bulley's Primrose · Buttonhead Primrose · Primula chionantha · Primula cockburniana · Drumstick Primrose · Oxlip · Tibetan Cowslip · Primula frondosa · Japanese primrose · Primula kisoana · Baby Primrose

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Primula alpicola by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

Credits & terms

Identify a plant

Point at a leaf or flower and snap. One plant in frame works best.

Your photo
Starting camera…