Mountain girl that I am, trillium is one of my favorite flowers. TechnicallyTrillium ovatum, also known as Pacific trillium, is what I think of when I think “trillium” because it’s the one I grew up with in the Coast Range of Oregon. Trillium plants look simple (just three petals and three sepals), but they are actually a complex little botanical. They live for decades, so you can form long-term relationships with them and welcome them back year after year. Unfortunately, however, they are slow to develop and spread, which is a serious weakness in the face of habitat loss and rampant wildharvesting. Between land use issues, trillium collectors who dig up wild varieties, deer who love to munch its leaves, and herbalists who seek out the rhizomes to make potent formulations, wild trillium is now in trouble. Let’s take a look at an age-old herbal ally and what we can do to preserve this beautiful, fragile plant.
According to the United States Department of Agriculture, there are 43 species of trillium around the world, 38 of which can be found in North America and five which are found in Asia. Trillium erectum is the species best known for its medicinal properties, but actually several trillium species contain the chemical compounds called sapogenins that have been utilized in herbal formulations for thousands of years as astringents, coagulants, expectorants, and stimulants for the uterus (which is how trillium got nicknames like “birth root”).
All trillium species belong to the Liliaceae (lily) family and are generally divided into two major groups: pedicellate trilliums (the flower sits on a small stalk that extends out from the plant) and sessile trilliums (the flower appears to rise directly from the bracts with no stalk). Both groups share some interesting complexities in propagation.
Trillium is very slow growing; it takes decades to establish a healthy, vibrant colony. If left undisturbed, it will ultimately spread by rhizomes to create a carpet of early-spring flowers on the forest floor. It can also propagate by seed, but this is even slower. Like many other spring ephemerals, it belongs to a group of plants that spread seed via ants (also mice). The seeds have a fatty white substance on them called elaisome, that ants love. The ants carry the seeds to their colony’s underground midden where they eat the elaisome but discard the seed itself. Those discarded seeds might germinate in the organically rich environment of the midden, but that takes two years because they have what is called a “double dormancy.” After one year underground, a root appears, followed by a little rhizome. The seedling then remains there for another year, at which point it will finally grow its first leaf (actually a bract that is leaf-like). Two more years will pass before the seedling produces the classic whorl of three leaves (bracts) that we are familiar with.
Photo From the Collection of The Lloyd Library and Museum.
It takes several more years for the trillium to store up enough energy to produce a flower. In an ideal situation, a single trillium may be seven or eight years old before it produces its first flower, and if conditions aren’t ideal, it can take a decade. Also, if the bulb is disturbed while in bloom (which sometimes happens when collectors set out to find trilliums to transplant), that plant may not bloom again for several more years. When you see a large population of flowering trillium, that colony could easily be 50 years old!
Although picking the flower does not harm the plant, it does keep it from making seeds that year, so picking flowers impacts the longterm health of the colony. Picking the green leaves can kill a trillium because, as with other bulbs, if you remove the leaves, the plant can’t make food. Since trillium only has three leaves to start with and because it generally lives in shaded woodlands, it needs all of its leaves for photosynthesis, in order to suck up every bit of spring sunlight and nutrients it can before the tree canopy leafs out above it. When a well-established trillium has leaf damage or loss, it might be able to recover by skipping flowering for a few years until it can rebuild its reserves. But younger plants with smaller rhizomes often don’t have the ability to survive the same kind of damage. It is easy to accidentally kill trillium through attempts to transplant from the wild or to harvest rhizomes.
Combine trillium’s slow propagation with other pressures like deer predation, an increase in invasive species, and loss of habitat due to changes in land use, and you start to see why trillium is in danger. Now add in the fact that trillium is one of the most frequently stolen plants in the wild! Because it takes so long to germinate and flower, it isn’t a profitable plant for most nurseries, which means there is a market for poached plants for both trillium collectors and wildharvesters who want the rhizomes to sell to herbal distributors or for personal formulations. A few people can decimate a healthy trillium colony in very little time and the colonies rarely recover. It is no wonder that everyone—from Mountain Rose Herbs, to United Plant Savers (UpS), to the U.S. Forest Service—begs people to purchase cultivated trillium plants from a reputable nursery rather than ever wildharvesting this precious plant.
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Topics: Sustainability, Herbalism
Heidi is an award winning freelance writer with a passion for urban homesteading. She has been honored to receive a number of literary prizes including the esteemed Pushcart Prize and an Individual Artists Award in Creative Writing from the Oregon Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts. She is proud to have earned a certificate of completion for the Herbal Medicine Making Course at the Chestnut School of Herbal Medicine. When she isn’t working in the garden, cleaning the henhouse, preserving food, crafting herbal formulations, or writing and editing content for really fantastic small businesses, you’ll likely find her with her nose in a book.
Mountain girl that I am, trillium is one of my favorite flowers. TechnicallyTrillium ovatum, also known as Pacific trillium, is what I think of when I think “trillium” because it’s the one I grew up with in the Coast Range of Oregon. Trillium plants look simple (just three petals and three sepals), but they are actually a complex little botanical. They live for decades, so you can form long-term relationships with them and welcome them back year after year. Unfortunately, however, they are slow to develop and spread, which is a serious weakness in the face of habitat loss and rampant wildharvesting. Between land use issues, trillium collectors who dig up wild varieties, deer who love to munch its leaves, and herbalists who seek out the rhizomes to make potent formulations, wild trillium is now in trouble. Let’s take a look at an age-old herbal ally and what we can do to preserve this beautiful, fragile plant.
According to the United States Department of Agriculture, there are 43 species of trillium around the world, 38 of which can be found in North America and five which are found in Asia. Trillium erectum is the species best known for its medicinal properties, but actually several trillium species contain the chemical compounds called sapogenins that have been utilized in herbal formulations for thousands of years as astringents, coagulants, expectorants, and stimulants for the uterus (which is how trillium got nicknames like “birth root”).
All trillium species belong to the Liliaceae (lily) family and are generally divided into two major groups: pedicellate trilliums (the flower sits on a small stalk that extends out from the plant) and sessile trilliums (the flower appears to rise directly from the bracts with no stalk). Both groups share some interesting complexities in propagation.
Trillium is very slow growing; it takes decades to establish a healthy, vibrant colony. If left undisturbed, it will ultimately spread by rhizomes to create a carpet of early-spring flowers on the forest floor. It can also propagate by seed, but this is even slower. Like many other spring ephemerals, it belongs to a group of plants that spread seed via ants (also mice). The seeds have a fatty white substance on them called elaisome, that ants love. The ants carry the seeds to their colony’s underground midden where they eat the elaisome but discard the seed itself. Those discarded seeds might germinate in the organically rich environment of the midden, but that takes two years because they have what is called a “double dormancy.” After one year underground, a root appears, followed by a little rhizome. The seedling then remains there for another year, at which point it will finally grow its first leaf (actually a bract that is leaf-like). Two more years will pass before the seedling produces the classic whorl of three leaves (bracts) that we are familiar with.
Photo From the Collection of The Lloyd Library and Museum.
It takes several more years for the trillium to store up enough energy to produce a flower. In an ideal situation, a single trillium may be seven or eight years old before it produces its first flower, and if conditions aren’t ideal, it can take a decade. Also, if the bulb is disturbed while in bloom (which sometimes happens when collectors set out to find trilliums to transplant), that plant may not bloom again for several more years. When you see a large population of flowering trillium, that colony could easily be 50 years old!
Although picking the flower does not harm the plant, it does keep it from making seeds that year, so picking flowers impacts the longterm health of the colony. Picking the green leaves can kill a trillium because, as with other bulbs, if you remove the leaves, the plant can’t make food. Since trillium only has three leaves to start with and because it generally lives in shaded woodlands, it needs all of its leaves for photosynthesis, in order to suck up every bit of spring sunlight and nutrients it can before the tree canopy leafs out above it. When a well-established trillium has leaf damage or loss, it might be able to recover by skipping flowering for a few years until it can rebuild its reserves. But younger plants with smaller rhizomes often don’t have the ability to survive the same kind of damage. It is easy to accidentally kill trillium through attempts to transplant from the wild or to harvest rhizomes.
Combine trillium’s slow propagation with other pressures like deer predation, an increase in invasive species, and loss of habitat due to changes in land use, and you start to see why trillium is in danger. Now add in the fact that trillium is one of the most frequently stolen plants in the wild! Because it takes so long to germinate and flower, it isn’t a profitable plant for most nurseries, which means there is a market for poached plants for both trillium collectors and wildharvesters who want the rhizomes to sell to herbal distributors or for personal formulations. A few people can decimate a healthy trillium colony in very little time and the colonies rarely recover. It is no wonder that everyone—from Mountain Rose Herbs, to United Plant Savers (UpS), to the U.S. Forest Service—begs people to purchase cultivated trillium plants from a reputable nursery rather than ever wildharvesting this precious plant.
You may also enjoy:
Topics: Sustainability, Herbalism
Heidi is an award winning freelance writer with a passion for urban homesteading. She has been honored to receive a number of literary prizes including the esteemed Pushcart Prize and an Individual Artists Award in Creative Writing from the Oregon Arts Commission and the National Endowment for the Arts. She is proud to have earned a certificate of completion for the Herbal Medicine Making Course at the Chestnut School of Herbal Medicine. When she isn’t working in the garden, cleaning the henhouse, preserving food, crafting herbal formulations, or writing and editing content for really fantastic small businesses, you’ll likely find her with her nose in a book.
