Kingdom: Plantae

Phylum: Magnoliophyta -- flowering plants

Class: Liliopsida -- monocots

Family: Liliaceae -- lily

Variety: the Palouse phase is var. macrocarpus

Common Name: sagebrush mariposa lily

Species Code: CAMA5

Origin: Native to dry, open areas of shrub-steppe, meadow-steppe, and open ponderosa pine forest of eastern Washington, eastern Oregon, and northern Idaho.

Rare: The common phase, both on the Palouse and elsewhere, is var. macrocarpus. C. macrocarpus var. maculosus is a rare phase which occurs in Garfield County and Asotin County in Washington and Nez Perce County in Idaho. Variety maculosus is ranked S1 in Washington by the Natural Heritage Program and S2 in Idaho by the Conservation Data Center.

Form: forb, perennial from a bulb, 20-60 cm tall, erect.

Duration: perennial

Habitat Type: prairie

Wetland Indicator Status: not listed

Leaves: 3-5, linear, channeled, becoming involute near the tips, glaucous, 5-25 cm long.

Mature height: 8-24 inches

Flowers: 1-4; sepals as long as petals, greenish or purple, linear-lanceolate, scarious margined, 3-5 cm long; petals ovate, lavender or white, with a green band through the center and sometimes a purple band above the gland

Flower color: purple, white

Bloom: July, August

Bloom starts on: late July

Bloom ends on: early August

Fruit: capsule, lance-linear, lacking wings; seeds beige, flattened

Characteristics:
Pollinated by insects (Miller et al 2004).
Reproduces sexually by seed. Miller et al (2004) found no evidence of propagation from bulblets in British Columbia.
Some bulbs may remain dormant in the soil through 1 or more seasons (Miller et al 2004).
Perennating organ is a bulb.
n=7 (Hitchcock et al 1969, Baldwin et al 2003, University of British Columbia 2003, Flora of North America Editorial Committee 1993).
Pollinated by a wide variety of insects including Lepidoptera and Coleoptera (Miller et al 2004).
Flowers are perfect.
The bulb is edible and was used raw or cooked by native peoples. The flower buds were also eaten (Moerman 2003).
Fruit is a capsule.
May be self compatible or outcrossed. The anthers shed pollen at the same time that the stigmas become receptive (Miller et al 2004).
Livestock eat the plants and they disappear quickly with overgrazing (Hitchcock et al 1969).
Deer will eat the green capsules.

Sun requirement: full

Soil moisture: xeric

Precipitation: 7-16 inches (USDA NRCS PLANTS Database 2009).

Fire: Increases after fire (Wikeem & Strang 1983).

Sowing time: fall

Transplant time: not recommended

Stratification: cold moist

Seed yield: no information available

Seed first harvest: no information available

Seed cleaning: no information available

Planting duration: no information available

Seed shatter: high

Seed size: medium

Seed harvest date: no information available

Herbaria: Specimen data and digital resources from The Consortium of Pacific Northwest Herbaria

Propagation:
Propagates freely from seed but bulbs collected in the wild seldom survive more than a few years (Hitchcock et al 1969).
Calochortus spp. are notoriously difficult to grow and transplanted bulbs do not survive. The taller inland species may establish from seed sown on site (Kruckeberg 1996).

Notes: Once a widespread and common species, but now uncommon due to habitat disturbance.

References:
Baldwin, B.G., S. Boyd, B.J. Ertter, D.J. Keil, R.W. Patterson, T.J. Rosatti, and D.H. Wilken (eds). 2004. Jepson Online Interchange for California Floristics. University and Jepson Herbaria, University of California, Berkeley, CA. Accessed 7/25/09 online at http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/interchange.html

Fiedler, Peggy Lee. 1987. Life History and Population Dynamics of Rare and Common Mariposa Lilies (Calochortus Pursh: Liliaceae). Journal. of Ecology 75: 977-995.

Flora of North America Editorial Committee, eds. 1993+. Flora of North America North of Mexico. 7+ vols. New York and Oxford. Oxford University Press. Online at http://www.fna.org/FNA/

Hitchcock, C. Leo, Arthur Cronquist, Marion Ownbey, and J.W. Thompson. 1969. Vascular Plants of the Pacific Northwest. University of Washington Press. Seattle, WA. 5 vol.

Kruckeberg, Arthur R. 1996. Gardening with Native Plants of the Pacific Northwest. University of Washington Press. Seattle, WA.

McDonald, Hugh P., and Karin R. Stokkink. 1995. Magnificent Mariposas. American Horticulturalist 74(Dec):31-36.

Miller, M.T., G.A. Allen, and J.A. Antos. 2004. Dormancy and Flowering in Two Mariposa Lilies (Calochortus) with Contrasting Distribution Patterns. Canadian Journal of Botany 82:1790-1799.

Moerman, Dan. 2003. Native American Ethnobotany: a Database of Foods, Drugs, Dyes and Fibers of Native American Peoples, Derived from Plants. University of Michigan-Dearborn. Online at http://herb.umd.umich.edu/ Accessed 12/31/05.

University of British Columbia. 2003. British Columbia Flora. University of British Columbia Botanical Garden and Centre for Plant Research. Online at http://www.bcflora.org/ Accessed 1/1/06.

USDA NRCS. 2009. The PLANTS Database (http://plants.usda.gov, 27 July 2009). National Plant Data Center, Baton Rouge, LA 70874-4490 USA.

Wikeem, Brian M., and R.M. Strang. 1983. Prescribed Burning on B.C. Rangelands: the State of the Art. Journal of Range Management 36:3-8.

Links:
Plant Profile from the USDA PLANTS Database
Species description from Flora of North America
Species information from the University of Washington Herbarium