This is an atlas-informed split of Viola pubescens sensu lato (82817) into Viola eriocarpa (544286) and Viola pubescens sensu stricto (1467430). Viola eriocarpa is by far the more common of these two species, occurring over a wider geographic range, and in a greater variety of habitats. When it was included in V. pubescens sensu lato, it was sometimes differentiated as V. pubescens var. scabriuscula.

Some formatting for clarity is added by me, otherwise this is verbatim from the treatment by Ballard and coworkers (2023):

"In chasmogamous flower, the most likely species to be confused with [V. eriocarpa] are yellow-flowered V. glaberrima and V. pubescens. It differs from both species in:

• commonly producing multiple stems (these commonly declined at base or curved in chasmogamous flower, especially in plants with 2 or more stems) and
• 1 or more basal leaves per stem;

...[and further, from V. pubescens specifically, in having:]

• glabrous to hirtellous foliage and peduncles,
• leaves commonly 4 or more and inserted along most of the stem length,
• the first fully expanded leaf (at the second node) with 5–15 marginal teeth per side, and
• lanceolate to ovate stipules that are
• often cordate-auriculate on the outer side.

...

As narrowly circumscribed here, [V. pubescens] is very uniform in morphology, as compared to the much more variable V. eriocarpa with which it is often confused. Confusion has been historically due largely to quite extensive recognized local and regional trait variation in V. eriocarpa, resulting in large-scale misidentification of V. eriocarpa specimens with some but not all of the traits of V. pubescens, particularly widespread moderately to heavily hirtellous few-stemmed individuals (or populations) of V. eriocarpa. This species can easily be separated from V. eriocarpa by:

• typically solitary stems,
• virtual absence of basal leaves,
• densely spreading-hirsute foliage and peduncles,
• 2–3 cauline leaves clustered in the upper fifth-to-third of the stem,
• typically ovate stipules with cuneate bases,
• broader cauline leaf blades with broadly cuneate to truncate bases and
• obtuse to short abruptly acute apex, and
• first fully expanded leaf (at the second node) with 13–26 marginal teeth per side°

°(northern populations having 16 or more, thus expressing no overlap with V. eriocarpa)."

...

[And from earlier in the paper:]
"We employed 'hirsute' for longer hairs generally > 1 mm long, 'hirtellous' for shorter hairs between 0.25 and 1 mm long, and 'puberulent' for very small hairs , 0.25 mm long (these usually best seen with a hand lens). ... We applied 'sparse' or 'weak' for widely spaced, interrupted, or scattered hairs; 'moderate' for closely spaced hairs not obscuring or covering the surface; and 'dense' for hairs tightly spaced and mostly or completely obscuring or covering the surface."