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White avalanche-lily

Erythronium montanum

Also called Avalanche lily, Glacier Fawn Lily, Western White Fawn Lily, White Glacier Lily

White avalanche-lily
Photo: Walter Siegmund (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0

Erythronium montanum is a bulbous spring wildflower of the lily family, native to mountain meadows and woodlands of the Pacific Northwest, known for its white flowers that bloom as snow melts. It is rarely grown in gardens and is best kept cool and moist in the growing season with a summer dormancy.

Family
Liliaceae (Lily family)
Grows as
Bulb
Light
Part shade
Water
Keep moist during spring growth, then keep dry while the bulb is dormant in summer.
Soil
Humus-rich, well-drained woodland soil or gritty loam.
Temperature
Hardy to about -20 °C; prefers cool summers.
How easy
Hard
Native range
SW. British Columbia to N. Oregon
Climate
temperate

About

Erythronium montanum, the avalanche lily or white avalanche lily, is a member of the lily family native to coastal British Columbia and the alpine and subalpine Olympic and Cascade Ranges of the Pacific Northwest of Washington and Oregon.

Erythronium montanum flowers shortly after the snow melts in late spring, in damp subalpine woodlands and alpine meadows, often in extensive patches. Blooming plants may persist into midsummer about the edges of snowfields. In the central Cascades, it is often found flowering admixed with Clintonia uniflora and Trillium ovatum at the lower elevation end of its range, and with Pulsatilla occidentalis(syn. Anemone occidentalis) at higher elevations. Distinguishing characteristics of this species are the oblong-lanceolate unmottled leaves and tepals that are white with a yellow base.

Other Erythronium plants

White fawnlily · Dogtooth violet · California fawnlily · Caucasian Dog's Tooth Violet · Cream fawnlily · Dog's-tooth-violet · Coast Range fawnlily · Yellow avalanche-lily · Pacific fawnlily · Henderson's fawnlily · Howell's fawnlily · Erythronium idahoense

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Erythronium montanum 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.

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