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Trillium
Also called Wakerobin, Birthroots, Birthworts, Toadshades, Trilliums, Wakerobins
Trillium is a genus of about fifty perennial woodland herbs from rhizomes, with three leaf-like bracts and a single three-petaled flower, mostly native to temperate North America and Asia. Most commonly grown members are shade-loving woodland species that need cool, moist, humus-rich soil and undisturbed roots.
Trillium (trillium, wakerobin, toadshade, tri flower, birthroot, birthwort, and sometimes "wood lily") is a genus of about fifty flowering plant species in the family Melanthiaceae. Trillium species are native to temperate regions of North America and Asia, with the greatest diversity of species found in the southern Appalachian Mountains in the southeastern United States.
Trilliums are myrmecochorous, that is, ants act as agents of seed dispersal. Each seed of a ripe fruit has a white fleshy appendage called an elaiosome. Ants are attracted to the elaiosome, so much so they often bore holes into the fruit instead of waiting for it to drop off on its own. The ants carry the seeds back to their nest where they eat the elaiosomes and discard the seeds. Here the seeds eventually germinate, an average of about 1 meter away from the parent plant.
Several species contain sapogenins. They have been used traditionally as uterine stimulants, the inspiration for the common name birthwort. In a 1918 publication, Joseph E. Meyer called it "beth root", probably a corruption of "birthroot". He claimed that an astringent tonic derived from the root was useful in controlling bleeding and diarrhea.
Giant white wakerobin · Giant wakerobin · Red trillium · White trillium · Yellow wakerobin · Snow trillium · Pacific trillium · Sweet wakerobin
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Trillium 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.
