Description
A unique Japanese species in which petals are missing (hence the name “a” = none, “petalon” = petals). Stranger still is the fact that the sepals (which are green and leafy in most other Trillium), have become purple and petal-like. The result looks like a purple Trillium without sepals, when the reverse is actually true!
The flowers can be green, green and red or, most usually, blood-red to purple. The effect is both attractive and unusual, though this is not a big flamboyant species. In this strain, the flowers are green petalled but the edges of the petals are stained with red and the anthers are also red. The form shown is a typical one, from our stock, however there is a degree of variation, this is a strain not a clone, so not every plant will be identical with the picture however all have red petal edges and red anthers.
Easily grown in typical Trillium conditions of half-shade and a soil rich in humus. Fully hardy here. The species generally remains little known in Europe.
Our stock is true Trillium apetalon. The name of the very rare smallii is frequently used interchangeably in literature and 99% of the pictures which you will find by googling “Trillium smallii” are in fact Trillium apetalon. The two are very frequently confused both in the UK and in Japan, in nursery lists and in scientific literature (especially earlier literature, where mentions of either species need to be treated with caution). T. smallii is in fact a valid name, T. apetalon and T. smallii are two species which are distinct and in fact they are very different. They can be told apart easily based on the very different appearance of their flowers, leaves, sepals and pistils and if you are dedicated by their anther:filament ratio and in fact even their chromosomes are different! It is just the names that are wrongly confused.
