Trillium chloropetalum

Giant trillium

Family: Melanthiaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Giant trillium is a California native perennial found in the Klamath Ranges, northern Coast Ranges, Central Coast, and San Francisco Bay Area in moist redwood forest edges, chaparral, and canyon banks at elevations of 100 to 2,000 meters. Flowering from April to May, this plant produces remarkable flowers ranging from yellow to pink to dark purple, occasionally white, with erect petals 6.5 to 10 centimeters long and a sweet rose-like or spicy fragrance. Growing with stems 20 to 70 centimeters tall, it forms large, striking clumps with distinctive sessile leaves. Its broad leaves are 7 to 21 centimeters long and wide, rounded at the tip and often subtly mottled with brown-green spots. The fruit is an ovoid, red-purple pulpy structure with obscure six-sided angles.

Habitat: Edges of redwood forest, chaparral, generally moist slopes, canyon banks in alluvial soils

Bloom period: Apr-May

Elevation: 100-2000 m

Bioregions: KR, NCoRI, CCo, SnFrB.

California counties: Sonoma, El Dorado, Alameda, Siskiyou, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Mendocino, San Benito, Shasta, Yuba, Humboldt, Contra Costa, Monterey, Lake, Marin, Tehama, Santa Cruz, Glenn, Napa, Madera, Santa Barbara, Butte, Placer, Del Norte, Nevada, Colusa

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.