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Liliaceae FAMILY

Fritillaria meleagris

Fritillaria meleagris

Edibility
0/5
Medicinal
1/5

Safety & Hazards

The bulb is poisonous[1].

Cultivation Details

HabitBulb
Growth—

Fritillaria meleagris is a very cold-hardy plant, tolerating temperatures down to around -30°c. An easily grown plant, it prefers a moist non-acid soil and a sunny position[2, 3, 4]. Succeeds in any soil, preferring a light soil with plenty of humus[5, 6]. Succeeds in sun or light shade[5, 6]. Grows well in short turf[7]. A very ornamental plant[5], it often self-sows when in a suitable position. Rabbits are very fond of this plant and will destroy it wholesale if given the opportunity[8]. A good plant for the spring meadow[3, 6, 9]. The flowers are very attractive to bees[7]. Plants should not be allowed to dry out in the summer[6].

Propagation

Seed - best sown as soon as ripe in a well-drained, sandy or gritty soil in a cold frame, it should germinate in the spring[5]. Protect from frost[9]. Stored seed should be sown as soon as possible and can take a year or more to germinate[9]. Sow the seed quite thinly to avoid the need to prick out the seedlings. Once they have germinated, give them an occasional liquid feed to ensure that they do not suffer mineral deficiency. Once they die down at the end of their second growing season, divide up the small bulbs, planting 2 - 3 to an 8cm deep pot. Grow them on for at least another year in light shade in the greenhouse before planting them out whilst dormant. Division of offsets in August[5]. The larger bulbs can be planted out direct into their permanent positions, but it is best to pot up the smaller bulbs and grow them on in a cold frame for a year before planting them out in the autumn. Bulb scales[10]. Cite as: Temperate Plants Database, Ken Fern. temperate.theferns.info. 2026-02-21. <temperate.theferns.info/plant/Fritillaria+meleagris>

Pollinators

Bees, Self

References

  1. [1]Flowers of Europe - A Field Guide. — Polunin. O. · Oxford University Press · 1969 · ISBN 0192176218 ↩︎An excellent and well illustrated pocket guide for those with very large pockets. Also gives some details on plant uses.
  2. [2]Flora of the British Isles. — Clapham, Tutin and Warburg. · Cambridge University Press · 1962 · ISBN - ↩︎A very comprehensive flora, the standard reference book but it has no pictures.
  3. [3]Making a Wildlife Garden. — Baines. C. ↩︎Fairly good with lots of ideas about creating wildlife areas in the garden.
  4. [4]Hardy Bulbs.; Including Half-hardy Bulbs and Tuberous and Fiberous-rooted Plants — Grey. C. H. · Williams & Norgate. · 1938 · ISBN - ↩︎Rather dated now, but an immense work on bulbs for temperate zones and how to grow them. Three large volumes.
  5. [5]RHS Dictionary of Plants plus Supplement. 1956 — F. Chittendon. · Oxford University Press · 1951 · ISBN - ↩︎Comprehensive listing of species and how to grow them. Somewhat outdated, it has been replaced in 1992 by a new dictionary (see [ 200 ]).
  6. [6]Bulbs — Phillips. R. and Rix. M. · Pan Books · 1989 · ISBN 0-330-30253-1 ↩︎Superbly illustrated, it gives brief details on cultivation and native habitat.
  7. [7]Garden Plants Valuable to Bees. — International Bee Research Association. · International Bee Research Association. · 1981 · ISBN - ↩︎The title says it all.
  8. [8]A Modern Herbal. — Grieve. · Penguin · 1984 · ISBN 0-14-046-440-9 ↩︎Not so modern (1930's?) but lots of information, mainly temperate plants.
  9. [9]Growing from Seed. Volume 2. — Rice. G. (Editor) · Thompson and Morgan. · 1988 · ISBN - ↩︎Very readable magazine with lots of information on propagation. An interesting article on Ensete ventricosum.
  10. [10]Lilies and Related Plants. — RHS Lily Group. ↩︎Lots of interesting snippets about plants in the family Liliaceae (in the old, broad sense)
  11. [11]Flora of the USSR. — Komarov. V. L. · Israel Program for Scientific Translation · 1968 · http://www.biodiversitylibrary.org · ISBN - ↩︎An immense (25 or more large volumes) and not yet completed translation of the Russian flora. Full of information on plant uses and habitats but heavy going for casual readers. It can be downloaded from the Internet.