Authors:
(syn. P. canescens). Compactly cushion-forming, 3-6cm high by twice or more as wide. Leaves narrowly awl-shaped, cottony hairy at the base, 6-10mm long. Flowers about 1cm across, solitary, pale sometimes darker, lavender to white, lightly but sweetly scented, spring. British Columbia to Manitoba in Canada and the Great Plains of U.S.A., south to Utah and Colorado, often amongst prairie grasses on dry clayey flats and slopes. P.h. viscidula differs only in forming larger cushions bearing glandular-hairy flowering stems, (the stems of P. hoodii itself are merely pubescent). P.h. muscoides, syn. P. muscoides is densely hummock-forming to 4cm high, often flat-topped and of great width in the wild. Leaves broadly awl-shaped, 3-5mm long and concave. Flowers 6-9mm wide, always white, fragrant. (Not in Canada). [Pl.351].
Locklear (2012) recognises subsp. muscoides as a species and has just two subspp. P.h.subsp. hoodii and P.h.subsp.canescens.
