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Allium oreophilum; photograph Svyatoslav Knyazev, CC BY, iNaturalist via GBIF CC BYSvyatoslav Knyazev, CC BY, iNaturalist via GBIF

Allium oreophilum C.A.Mey.

Ornamental Onion; Pink lily leek

Amaryllidaceae · North Caucasus, Transcaucasus +1 · listed by its family as a bulb, tuber or caudex

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Allium oreophilum, photograph (c) Alex Sosnovshchenko, some rights reserved (CC BY)Allium oreophilum, photograph Svyatoslav Knyazev, CC BY, iNaturalist via GBIFAllium oreophilum, photograph Meneerke bloem, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia CommonsAllium oreophilum, photograph ghislain118 http://www.fleurs-des-montagnes.net, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsAllium oreophilum, photograph ghislain118 http://www.fleurs-des-montagnes.net, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsAllium oreophilum, photograph ghislain118 http://www.fleurs-des-montagnes.net, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons 15 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Coldest month, mean nightly low
-16.6°C
Jan at the habitat, not a floor; extremes not used (the weather cell's ground is too far off) CHELSA
Warmest month, mean daily high
14°C
Jul and Aug at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,050mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
12–39DLI
Lowest to highest month (DLI) CHELSA
The year in your months, northern hemisphere
  1. Jan
  2. Feb
  3. Mar
  4. Apr
  5. May
  6. Jun
  7. Jul
  8. Aug
  9. Sep
  10. Oct
  11. Nov
  12. Dec
Wet summers: the rain comes April to October, read as a summer growing season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Allium oreophilum, the pink lily leek, is a species of monocot plant in the Amaryllidaceae family native to an area extending from Western China to Turkey and the Caucasus.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Allium oreophilum", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Allium

Allium is a large genus of monocotyledonous flowering plants with 1112 accepted species, making Allium the largest genus in the family Amaryllidaceae and among the largest plant genera in the world. Many of the species are edible, and some have a long history of cultivation and human consumption such as the onion, garlic, scallions, shallots, leeks, and chives.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Allium", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

Grouped as a bulb, tuber or caudex, listed under the family Amaryllidaceae in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “bulbous geophyte”.

Seasons

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (779 mm of 1,011 mm) falls in April to October, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 5.1 °C against a yearly mean of -1.1 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: October to April.

Rain

1,011 mm in the median year at the habitat, 779 mm of it April to October. Wettest month June at 144 mm, driest month January at 31 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 848 mm to 1,313 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,050 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,011 mm here is the median year's, the twelve monthly medians added, which the rain rule reads. Habitat calendar, northern hemisphere; median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA.

Light

Open sky over the habitat: 12 to 39 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 11, the highest 90th-percentile month 40).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low -16.6 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -19.1 °C to -13.9 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 14.3 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: none read. The nearest figure is -16.6 °C, the coldest month's mean nightly low, January, in the median year (CHELSA); a month's mean of its nightly lows is warmer than the nights a floor is read from. The daily extremes were read at a weather cell whose ground is too far above or below the typical spot to correct for, and are not used.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 54 to 61% across the year (monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

How this section is made

Each card states this species' habitat figures with their sources, and what two fixed rules read from them; nothing here says what the plant does, wants or tolerates. The rules · the terms.

Seasons. Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the grid cells of the range: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve moves 4 °C or more and the habitat lies 10° or more from the equator. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain. CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the grid cells of the range. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light. CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Temperature. CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. No cold floor is read without a daily extremes series; the coldest month's mean nightly low named in its sentence is not one. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity. CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the grid cells of the range.

Group. Listed under the family Amaryllidaceae in the archetype table, and Kew describes it as “bulbous geophyte”. A group is taken only where Kew's description of the species agrees with the table's listing. The table gives no figure and no prose; the cold floor is the habitat's alone.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat months, northern hemisphere

Habitat climate of Allium oreophilum through the yearWarmest months July and August, mean daily high 14 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low -16.6 °C; 1,011 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°frost°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200mm rainDLI 12–39RH 54–61%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 10 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C-8 / -12–-5-8 / -11–-5-5 / -8–-12 / -1–57 / 4–912 / 9–1314 / 12–1614 / 12–1610 / 7–125 / 2–7-2 / -5–1-7 / -10–-4
Night °C-17 / -19–-14-16 / -18–-13-12 / -15–-10-6 / -9–-5-2 / -5–03 / 0–56 / 4–86 / 4–82 / -1–4-4 / -6–-1-10 / -13–-8-15 / -17–-12
Rain mm31 / 28–4045 / 33–5668 / 52–8087 / 79–116131 / 108–167144 / 108–190123 / 80–189113 / 76–16895 / 79–11886 / 72–10656 / 50–7332 / 27–42
DLI14 / 13–1621 / 20–2329 / 27–3135 / 33–3636 / 36–3739 / 38–4039 / 37–4034 / 33–3527 / 26–2820 / 19–2214 / 13–1612 / 11–14
RH %55 / 53–5756 / 54–5857 / 55–5959 / 58–6160 / 59–6260 / 60–6261 / 60–6361 / 60–6258 / 56–6056 / 55–5955 / 52–5654 / 52–56

The daily extremes were not used: the correction for elevation, +1284 m, is beyond the 1,000 m either way that a lapse rate is applied over, so the weather cell's ground is other terrain than the typical spot's. So no cold floor is read for this species, and the coldest month's mean nightly low is not taken as one. What that cell gave, so corrected, over 44 years: absolute minimum -33.8 °C, 1st-percentile night -22.6 °C.

How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 10 grid cells holding the 12 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. A dash is a month one or more of those cells has no figure for in the grid (a variable CHELSA does not carry there), so no median is taken rather than one over fewer cells. Extremes and elevation were read at a typical spot in the range, cell 943:4527 (42.825, 46.375). Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Across the range: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 10 distinct grid cells holding 12 of the 12 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 943:4527 (its coldest month's mean nightly low nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 43.00_46.250, lapse-corrected +1284 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 2293 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across the cells of the in-range records placed well enough to read one, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeNorth Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Turkey · regions are the level-3 units of the World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions, as Kew's World Checklist records ranges, some under historical names such as Yugoslavia or Czechoslovakia (how).
Map marker41.313, 47.524 · in the densest population, 19 records (90% of those in range)
Kew's description“bulbous geophyte” · “subalpine or subarctic” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 21 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 12 of them placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 12 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 2 km away. 152 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 9 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km, or with no stated accuracy (admitted only as a person's observation to three decimals), and stay on the map but off the climate.
How this section is made
The map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 21 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Allium oreophilum, photograph 1did not loadAllium oreophilum, photograph 2did not loadAllium oreophilum, photograph 3did not loadAllium oreophilum, photograph 4did not loadAllium oreophilum, photograph 5did not loadAllium oreophilum, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Alex Sosnovshchenko, some rights reserved (CC BY); Svyatoslav Knyazev, CC BY, iNaturalist via GBIF; Meneerke bloem, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons; ghislain118 http://www.fleurs-des-montagnes.net, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons (3).

Similar habitat climate The 6 nearest by mean daily high, mean nightly low and rain, month by month. How.

Dracocephalum botryoides Dracocephalum botryoides Lamiaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, peganum from Henfield, EnglandKoenigia panjutinii Koenigia panjutinii Polygonaceae Photo: CC BY, Oleg KosterinTanacetum niveum Tanacetum niveum Silver Tansy Photo: CC BY-SA, Ghislain118…Phedimus stevenianus Phedimus stevenianus Stolon stonecrop Photo: CC BY-SA, C T JohanssonMyricaria squamosa Myricaria squamosa Tamaricaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedPrimula algida Primula algida Primulaceae Photo: CC BY, Юлия Захаренко

Other Allium 241 in the reference

Allium acuminatum Allium acuminatum Tapertip onion Photo: CC BY-SA, Brian FinzelAllium acutiflorum Allium acutiflorum Amaryllidaceae Photo: CC BY, Nicola CrockfordAllium aflatunense Allium aflatunense Amaryllidaceae Photo: CC0, author not statedAllium akaka Allium akaka Amaryllidaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, C T Johansson Allium alexeianum Amaryllidaceae Allium altaicum Allium altaicum Altai onion Photo: CC BY, Urgamal MagsarAllium altissimum Allium altissimum Amaryllidaceae Photo: CC BY, Wolfgang AhlmerAllium altyncolicum Allium altyncolicum Altynkol Chive Photo: CC BY, Oleg KosterinAllium amethystinum Allium amethystinum Amethyst Garlic Photo: CC BY, Eleftherios KatsillisAllium ampeloprasum Allium ampeloprasum Wild Leek Photo: CC BY, Felix Blesch Allium amphibolum Amaryllidaceae Allium amplectens Allium amplectens Slim-leaved onion Photo: CC BY, Parker James Lloyd all 242 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Allium oreophilum var. ostrowskianum; Caloscordum oreophilum. (GBIF Backbone)

Kew accepts as species of their own Allium ostrowskianum; Allium platystemon: older names in GBIF's record of this species that Kew's World Checklist accepts as other species. (WCVP, RBG Kew, file of 2026-06-04)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Amaryllidaceae
Described by
C.A.Mey.
Native to
North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Turkey
Wild records
21 in range · 12 open

Every figure here is derived from public data by a stated rule and names its source; nothing about this species is written for its page by a person or by AI, apart from the marked, credited quotations. How →

Where this page came from built 2026-10-21
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-21
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-21names fetched 2026-10-21
WCVP native range wcvp.distribution answeredas of 2026-06-04
GBIF occurrence records gbif.occurrences answeredas of 2026-10-21GBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.hbdw64, of 2026-10-21; 2 records within 1 km of a botanic garden, herbarium or zoo left out (2 at a botanic garden or arboretum; Wikidata's list)
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-21
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-21NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 43.00_46.250, lapse-corrected +1284 m at 6.5 °C/km; read, and set aside: the correction for elevation, +1284 m, is beyond the 1,000 m either way that a lapse rate is applied over, so the weather cell's ground is other terrain than the typical spot's, so no cold floor is shown
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-21
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-21
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild answeredasked 2026-10-22from iNaturalist's open data of 2026-09-27: research-grade observations with an open-licence photograph, the 24 whose photographs iNaturalist received last (the open data holds no votes); filled 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, cultivated inat.photos.cultivated not asked
GBIF media gbif.media answeredasked 2026-10-21
Wikimedia Commons commons answeredasked 2026-10-21
OpenAlex papers openalex not askednot yet asked for this reference; a later fill takes the papers from OpenAlex's snapshot

Every source is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, refused, failed, not been asked, or answered twice where one answer is taken (“not taken: two items answered”), and, for a source asked when this page was built, when: the figures are as the source held them that day; a source read from a file (Kew's World Checklist, a GBIF download) says "as of" the file's day instead; a row carried from an earlier build of the page names that build instead. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 31 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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