{"id":2107,"date":"2013-03-28T11:12:16","date_gmt":"2013-03-28T19:12:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/?p=2107"},"modified":"2013-03-28T11:12:16","modified_gmt":"2013-03-28T19:12:16","slug":"the-oregon-fawn-lily-erythronium-oregonum-and-its-many-names","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/the-oregon-fawn-lily-erythronium-oregonum-and-its-many-names\/","title":{"rendered":"The Oregon Fawn Lily, Erythronium oregonum and its many names."},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Oregon<\/a>
\n<\/strong>\u00a9 2011 Aislinn Adams
\nOregon Fawn Lily, Erythronium oregonum.<\/em><\/p>\n


\nThe Fawn lily, Erythronium oregonum<\/em>, and its many common names.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Erythronium oregonum<\/i> has many common names- giant white fawn lily, Oregon fawn lily, dog\u2019s tooth violet, trout lily, adder\u2019s tongue, lamb’s tongue. Maybe this is why the Historic Deepwood Estate here in Salem, Oregon- where I live- has chosen the scientific name for their annual spring native plant festival. Not wishing to confuse people with a common name that is not \u201ccommon\u201d to all, they use the scientific name\u00a0Erythronium<\/em> (pronounced, err- ih-throne- ee-um.) Personally I find it much more useful to use the scientific name for the same reason. Never underestimate the creativity of humans to come up with interesting and numerous common names for one plant, and though they are lovely, ultimately they are rather confusing, especially when trying to communicate which plant you mean to someone.<\/p>\n

My first fawn lily,\u00a0Erythronium oregonum.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Erythronium oregonum<\/i> was one of the first bulbs I planted in my own garden when I moved to Oregon many years ago. It has since seeded itself throughout my front yard, totally ignoring all my efforts to corral this charming spring bloomer into an attractive sweep of creamy yellow. It was one of these flowers that I used for my botanical illustration above, and inspired me to create my Pacific Northwest Native Plant Greeting Card Series<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The fawn lily and early plant explorers.<\/b><\/p>\n

When I first saw this beautiful fawn lily here in the Willamette Valley I assumed it must have been collected by Lewis and Clark or David Douglas in the early 19th century. This is not the case. The first fawn lily to be described from this part of the world, pink fawn lily,\u00a0Erythronium revolutum<\/i>, was collected by Archibald Menzies in 1793 and described by James Edward Smith in 1809. Then in 1806 the fawn lily\u2019s mountain \u201ccousin\u201d the glacier lily, Erythronium grandiflorum,<\/i> was brought back by Lewis and Clark (Lewis called it a dog’s tooth violet in his journal) and described by Frederick Pursh in his Flora Americae Septentrionalis<\/em> in 1814. (for more on the collection see my blog \u00a0The saga of the Lewis and Clark Plant Collection and the Irish nurseryman Bernard McMahon\u2019s unwitting role in its fate!<\/em>.<\/a>) The glacier lily, Erythronium grandiflorum<\/i>, also has other common names including yellow fawn lily and yellow avalanche lily.<\/p>\n

The common fawn lily, Erythronium oregonoum, erroneously mis-identified.<\/b><\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until 1935 that the more common fawn lily, Erythronium oregonum, <\/i>was finally described by the Oregon botanist, Elmer Applegate. As is often the case with plant exploration and identification, the story is not that straightforward. According to Applegate \u201cfor nearly a century this familiar plant has been known erroneously as Erythronium giganteum<\/em> Lindl. or as Erythronium grandiflorum var. albiflorum<\/em>.\u201d (\u00a0Kalmiopsis<\/em> Vol. 10 2003. Native Plant Society of Oregon.) So maybe my assumption wasn\u2019t so far off the mark. Is it possible that some of the Erythronium grandiflorum<\/em>\u00a0bulbs collected by Douglas (April, 1826 and 1827) may have been\u00a0Erythronium oregonum<\/em> after all?<\/p>\n

Elmer Applegate and David Douglas.<\/strong><\/p>\n

There is a tenuous link of a different kind between Applegate and Douglas. Applegate\u2019s wife Esther Emily Ogden was a niece of Peter Skene Ogden (the well-known fur trader and chief trader with the Hudson\u2019s Bay Company.) Douglas met Ogden August 30, 1826 at Fort Vancouver, Washington, directly after Douglas\u2019 exciting 12-day descent of the Columbia River from Fort Colville in eastern Washington. During that descent he had a lucky escape when his canoe was wrecked at the Dalles; causing him to loose the insects he had collected in the interior and some seeds, but he managed to save bulbs of the glacier lily, Erythronium grandiflorum<\/i>, collected in the Fort Colville area. In April the following year, while on his journey overland to Hudson Bay to meet his ship bound for England, he collected more of the glacier lily in the same area and transplanted them in the hope of keeping them growing all the way to England. Maybe it was these particular transplants that were the first fawn lilies that he is credited with introducing into England. Now I wonder if they were all glacier lilies: if some of the Oregon fawn lilies had not been introduced into the mix also?<\/p>\n

When I drive by the Deepwood Estate along Mission Road here in Salem and see the expanse of pale yellow that is the fawn lily, it\u2019s hard to imagine that Douglas didn\u2019t see them while traveling though the Willamette Valley. At any rate, it is a wonderful sight to see and, no doubt, it will be enjoyed by the many visitors to the festival next weekend- Friday and Saturday April 5\u00a0and 6. For more information about the festival click here- http:\/\/historicdeepwoodestate.org\/historic\/estate\/calendar_events\/2013\/04\/05\/<\/a>\u00a0 I am delighted to say that my cards will be on sale at the festival also.<\/p>\n

Aislinn Adams<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a9 2011 Aislinn Adams Oregon Fawn Lily, Erythronium oregonum. The Fawn lily, Erythronium oregonum, and its many common names. Erythronium oregonum has many common names- giant white fawn lily, Oregon fawn lily, dog\u2019s tooth violet, trout lily, adder\u2019s tongue, lamb’s tongue. Maybe this is why the Historic Deepwood Estate here in Salem, Oregon- where I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[22,61,166,168,172,175,176,196,197,198,201,203,205],"tags":[202,204,29,206,37,46,55,141,150,151,161,163,164,178,179,199,200],"class_list":["post-2107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-botanical-illustration","category-native-plants","category-oregon-native-plant","category-pacific-northwest-native-plant","category-bernard-mcmahon","category-frederick-pursh","category-irish-nurseryman-2","category-archibald-menzies","category-david-douglas","category-elmer-applegate","category-fawn-lily","category-historic-deepwood-estate","category-oregon-fawn-lily","tag-glacier-lily","tag-historic-deepwood-estate","tag-native-plant","tag-oregon-fawn-lily","tag-botanical-illustration","tag-greeting-cards","tag-native-plants","tag-aislinn-adams","tag-erythronium-oregonum","tag-fawn-lily","tag-bernard-macmahon","tag-irish-nurseryman","tag-lewis-and-clark","tag-archibald-menzies","tag-david-douglas","tag-elmer-applegate","tag-erythronium-grandiflorum"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8UJpb-xZ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2107","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2107"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2107\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2107"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2107"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aislinnadams.com\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2107"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}