Lilium canadense , Canada lily, is a large showy native herbaceous perennial plant that blooms in late spring - summer.
Flowers
Individual Flowers:
The Canada lily flowers are trumpet shaped, about 2.5 inches across and like most lilies, droop and face down. They range in color from yellow to orange-red
Canada lily flower has 6 tepals. If you look closely, the 3 petals have ridges down the middle and form the inner whorl while the sepals have less prominent ridges and form the outer whorl of tepals.
The canada lily flower tepals are only recurved slightly at the tips. The anthers and stigma only extend slightly beyond the tepals
A look inside show the stigma and 6 anthers.
Inflorescence - flower clusters:
The flower clusters that I have seen are only a single cluster on the top of the plant as seen in the next 2 photos. No further flower stem is apparent.
The flower cluster is on top of the uppermost whorl of leaves, each flower with a long pedicel (stalk) that turns downward at the end so the flower droops.
This shows the flower pedicels growing from the top of the uppermost whorl of leaves.
Photo credit: Thomas Snape
However, the inflorescence is actually an upright raceme.
In the raceme arrangement, the main flower stem (peduncle) is long and has flowers, each with its own pedicel, growing along it.
The total number of flowers in a cluster range from 1-17.
The photo to the right shows all the flowers with the lowest growing just above the top whorl of leaves and more growing up along the flower stem.
Plants, Leaves and growth habit
The Canda lily grows to 3-8 ft. tall and has mostly whorled, lance-shaped leaves along its unbranched stem beneath the flowers. It has 3 to 12 leaves per whorl. There may be a few alternate leaves in between the whorls.
The habitat - moist meadows, wood margins.
Fruit & seeds
Photo credit: Thomas Snape
Photo credit: Thomas Snape
Photo credit: Thomas Snape
I want to specially thank Thomas Snape for sharing his photos with us. All other photos by H & M Ling, some 7/1/2019 in Sussex County, and others ~6/28/various years in cultivation, NJ.
Additional information
Additional information / references:
The USDA website shows the Canada lily distribution in the US and it is threathened in some states: https://plants.usda.gov/core/profile?symbol=LICA3 .
In New Jersey, it is not on the endangered plant species list, however, it is not common and is rare is parts of its distribution.
Plant descriptions and other information:
https://www.illinoiswildflowers.info/savanna/plants/canada_lily.htm
https://www.friendsofthewildflowergarden.org/pages/plants/canadalily.html
https://gobotany.nativeplanttrust.org/species/lilium/canadense/
Flora of North America: plant description and discussion of other varieties: http://www.efloras.org/florataxon.aspx?flora_id=1&taxon_id=242101728