Trillium maculatum | |
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Scientific classification ![]() | |
Kingdom: | Plantae |
Clade: | Tracheophytes |
Clade: | Angiosperms |
Clade: | Monocots |
Order: | Liliales |
Family: | Melanthiaceae |
Genus: | Trillium |
Species: | T. maculatum |
Binomial name | |
Trillium maculatum | |
Synonyms [4] | |
Trillium maculatum
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Trillium maculatum, the spotted wakerobin or spotted trillium, [5] [6] is a species of flowering plant in the family Melanthiaceae. It is a member of the Trillium cuneatum complex, a closely related group of sessile-flowered trilliums. The species is endemic to the southeastern United States, ranging across Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and northern Florida.
Trillium maculatum is a perennial, herbaceous, flowering plant that persists by means of an underground rhizome. Like all trilliums, it has a whorl of three bracts (leaves) and a single trimerous flower with three sepals, three petals, two whorls of three stamens each, and three carpels (fused into a single ovary with three stigmas). [7] It has a sessile flower (no flower stalk), erect petals, and mottled leaves. [8] Its flower petals are deep red or reddish-purple but occasionally yellow. [6]
Trillium maculatum was named and described by Constantine Samuel Rafinesque in 1830. [3] The specific epithet maculatum means "spotted", [9] a reference to the conspicuously marked leaves of some forms of this species. [10] Although Rafinesque described a plant with spotted stems, [11] later authors have not confirmed that character.[ citation needed ]
In his description of Trillium sessile in 1753, [12] [13] the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus referred to an earlier description and illustration of a taxon published by the English naturalist Mark Catesby in 1730. [14] However, Catesby's illustration was identified as Trillium maculatum by the American botanist John Daniel Freeman in 1975. [15] As a result of Linnaeus' misinterpretation of Catesby's illustration, numerous authors erroniously applied the name Trillium sessile prior to 1830.
Trillium maculatum is a member of the Trillium cuneatum complex, a group of eight taxa including Trillium luteum and Trillium cuneatum (in the strict sense). [16] All members of the complex are sessile-flowered trilliums (Trillium subgen. Sessilia).
Trillium maculatum is endemic to the southeastern United States, ranging across South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, and northern Florida. [4] [17]
Trillium maculatum flowers early February to early April. [18]