''Fritillaria recurva'', the scarlet fritillary, is a

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

bulb In botany, a bulb is structurally a short stem with fleshy leaves or leaf basesBell, A.D. 1997. ''Plant form: an illustrated guide to flowering plant morphology''. Oxford University Press, Oxford, U.K. that function as food storage organs duri ...

-forming

herbaceous Herbaceous plants are vascular plants that have no persistent woody stems above ground. This broad category of plants includes many perennials, and nearly all annuals and biennials. Definitions of "herb" and "herbaceous" The fourth edition of t ...

perennial plant A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also wide ...

in the lily family Liliaceae.Sierra Nevada Wildflowers, Karen Wiese, 2nd ed., 2013, p. 97 It is

native Native may refer to: People * Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Native Americans (disambiguation) In arts and entert ...

to the western United States, from southwest

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

down to northern

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

where it grows in the Klamath Mountains,

Northern Coast Ranges The Coast Ranges of California span from Del Norte or Humboldt County, California, south to Santa Barbara County. The other three coastal California mountain ranges are the Transverse Ranges, Peninsular Ranges and the Klamath Mountains. Phy ...

Cascade Range The Cascade Range or Cascades is a major mountain range of western North America, extending from southern British Columbia through Washington and Oregon to Northern California. It includes both non-volcanic mountains, such as the North Cascades, ...

, and

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada () is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primarily ...

. Most of the known Californian locations are in the northern half of the state, as far south as Solano and El Dorado Counties, but there are isolated populations in Tulare and Mariposa Counties. The species has also been reported from

Douglas Douglas may refer to: People * Douglas (given name) * Douglas (surname) Animals *Douglas (parrot), macaw that starred as the parrot ''Rosalinda'' in Pippi Longstocking *Douglas the camel, a camel in the Confederate Army in the American Civil W ...

and Washoe Counties in

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...

. It grows in dry, open woodlands and

chaparral Chaparral ( ) is a shrubland plant community and geographical feature found primarily in the U.S. state of California, in southern Oregon, and in the northern portion of the Baja California Peninsula in Mexico. It is shaped by a Mediterranean c ...

at , and it blooms in spring from February to July.

Description

''Fritillaria recurva'' is a bulb-forming perennial. The leaves are arranged in

whorls A whorl ( or ) is an individual circle, oval, volution or equivalent in a whorled pattern, which consists of a spiral or multiple concentric objects (including circles, ovals and arcs). Whorls in nature File:Photograph and axial plane floral d ...

and are linear to narrowly lanceolate. The

tepals A tepal is one of the outer parts of a flower (collectively the perianth). The term is used when these parts cannot easily be classified as either sepals or petals. This may be because the parts of the perianth are undifferentiated (i.e. of very ...

are scarlet, checkered with yellow on the inside, and form a bell shape, and are usually nodding and pendent. The Latin

specific epithet In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

"recurva" means "bent backwards". The fruit is a

winged A wing is a type of fin that produces lift while moving through air or some other fluid. Accordingly, wings have streamlined cross-sections that are subject to aerodynamic forces and act as airfoils. A wing's aerodynamic efficiency is expresse ...

capsule. The plant blooms from June to October, about two weeks earlier than ''F. gentneri'', which has a different reddish color. Throughout its range it is distinguishable from other ''

Fritillaria ''Fritillaria'' (fritillaries) is a genus of spring flowering herbaceous bulbous perennial plants in the lily family (Liliaceae). The type species, ''Fritillaria meleagris'', was first described in Europe in 1571, while other species from the ...

'' species by its scarlet red color, checkered with yellow on the inside, and recurved

tepal A tepal is one of the outer parts of a flower (collectively the perianth). The term is used when these parts cannot easily be classified as either sepals or petals. This may be because the parts of the perianth are undifferentiated (i.e. of very ...

s.Flora of North America, ''Fritillaria recurva'
/ref>Bentham, George. 1857. Plantas Hartwegianas imprimis Mexicanas 340.
/ref> Hybrids among the 10 species of ''Fritillaria'' make identification challenging. In southwest Oregon ''F. recurva'' is similar to the rare '' F. gentneri''. The latter can be distinguished from ''F. recurva'' by its branching style and longer nectary glands. Fritillaria recurva - panoramio.jpg Fritillaria recurva CBM.png Fritillaria recurva - Flickr 003.jpg

References

External links

Jepson Manual Treatment — ''Fritillaria recurva''United States Department of Agriculture Plants Profile — ''Fritillaria recurva''''Fritillaria recurva'' — University of California @ Berkeley, Calphotos Photo gallery
recurva Endemic flora of the United States Plants described in 1857 Flora without expected TNC conservation status {{liliales-stub