Large-flowered Trillium, Trillium grandiflorum, Native Minnesota Wildflower plant, Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden

	Plants of the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden
	Common Name	Scientific Name	Plant Family	Garden Location	Prime Season
	Large-flowered Trillium	Trillium grandiflorum (Michx) Salisb.	Lily	Woodland	Spring
Other names and notes	(White Trillium, Great White Trillium) One of the two large Trilliums that have an erect flower stalk (the other the Purple Trillium), the large white flowers are funnel shape at the base, on a mostly erect 2 - 3" stalk, showing nicely above the large leaves giving a total height of up to 16". The 3 petals are elliptical with pointed tips and are longer than the 3 green sepals. The petals turn pink with age. At maturity the fruit is a pale green berry about 1/2" wide.


	Above: The petals take on a pink tinge as they age.

Below: During the Garden curatorship of Martha Crone there was an extensive bed of Large-flowered Trillium in the Woodland Garden as this image of April 29, 1952 illustrates. Today there are many groupings of this species at various places in the Woodland Garden, but none with the extent of this former group. Photo from a Kodachrome slide by Martha Crone, courtesy of Minnesota Historical Society, Martha Crone Collection.

Notes: Eloise Butler's records show that she first obtained plants of this species in May 1908 and again on June 4, 1909 from Hawkins, WI; on Oct. 7, 1916 - 50 plants from Horsford's Nursery in Charlotte, Vermont, which she planted at the "base of the West Hillside"; additional plants on June 2, 1924 from Hillman, MN; additional plants on May 20, 1928 from the Mille Lacs Lake are in Minnesota; on Oct. 1, 1928 from Strands Nursery in Taylor's Falls. Martha Crone planted more in 1933, '34 and '35. Native mainly to east-central Minnesota which is the plant's most western approach in the U.S. In Canada it appears from Ontario eastward.

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References: Plant characteristics are generally from sources 15, 16, 30, 31, 33, W2 & W3. Distribution principally from W2 and also 31, 34 and W1. Planting history generally from 1, 4 & 4a. Other sources by specific reference. See Reference List for details.

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