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Gagea serotina; photograph (c) Trevor Van Loon, some rights reserved (CC BY) CC BY(c) Trevor Van Loon, some rights reserved (CC BY) · observed growing wild · 2026-06-29

Gagea serotina (L.) Ker Gawl.

Snowdon lily; Alpine lily; Alp lily; Common Alpine-lily

Liliaceae · Great Britain, Austria +63 · listed by its family as a bulb, tuber or caudex

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Gagea serotina, photograph (c) Matt Berger, some rights reserved (CC BY)Gagea serotina, photograph (c) Matt Berger, some rights reserved (CC BY)Gagea serotina, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedGagea serotina, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedGagea serotina, photograph author not stated, no rights reservedGagea serotina, photograph (c) Trevor Van Loon, some rights reserved (CC BY) 84 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-24.6°C
Record low -36.1 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
15°C
Jul at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
1,433mm
12 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
8–37DLI
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
Rain spread: 70% of the median year's rain takes 8 months, so no short rainy season. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Gagea serotina, synonym Lloydia serotina, is an Arctic–alpine flowering plant of the lily family. It is widespread across the mountainous parts of western North America, from Alaska to New Mexico, and in Europe is found in the Alps, the Carpathians and the mountains of Bulgaria, as well as in Great Britain. It is also native to much of Central Asia, Siberia, China, Nepal, Mongolia, Korea and Japan.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Gagea serotina", CC BY-SA 4.0.

Cultivation

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

Seasons

The rain rule reads no short rainy season: 70% of the median year's rain (1,014 mm of 1,369 mm) takes 8 months, April to November. Mean temperature moves 22.1 °C between the warmest and coldest month. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: October to May.

Rain

1,369 mm in the median year at the habitat, 1,014 mm of it April to November. Wettest month August at 144 mm, driest month February at 75 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 500 mm to 2,237 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 1,433 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 1,369 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: 8 to 37 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 0, the highest 90th-percentile month 49).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -24.6 °C, the absolute minimum -36.1 °C, 12,288 frost nights in 44 years, 279.3 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 18.8 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low -16.3 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -28.4 °C to -10.2 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 14.6 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -24.6 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range (NASA POWER).

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 59 to 63% 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. NASA POWER daily minima and maxima over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, lapse-corrected +676 m to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the grid cells of the range. The cold floor is the 1st-percentile night named in its sentence. 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 Liliaceae 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 Gagea serotina through the yearWarmest month July, mean daily high 15 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low -16.3 °C; 1,369 mm of rain in the median year (the twelve monthly medians added). Medians across the range, from CHELSA; the extremes at the edge from NASA POWER. Habitat months, northern hemisphere.-40°-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°frost18.8° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-36.1° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250mm rainDLI 8–37RH 59–63%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 844 habitat cells, CHELSA cold quarter: the three months around the coldest month's mean nightly low extremes over 44 years at a typical spot in the range, from NASA POWER, marked at the edge, in no month DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C-8 / -22–-2-6 / -21–-1-3 / -16–21 / -9–66 / 0–1112 / 7–1615 / 11–1914 / 10–1810 / 4–155 / -6–10-2 / -16–3-7 / -20–-1
Night °C-16 / -28–-10-16 / -27–-9-12 / -23–-6-8 / -16–-3-3 / -7–12 / -2–65 / 2–94 / 2–81 / -3–5-5 / -13–1-11 / -23–-5-16 / -27–-9
Rain mm86 / 25–16475 / 22–13896 / 24–164103 / 24–173132 / 31–221133 / 44–225133 / 59–243144 / 63–242132 / 50–219123 / 40–209114 / 28–19498 / 28–188
DLI10 / 1–1717 / 5–2425 / 15–3333 / 26–4137 / 33–4637 / 33–4937 / 29–4631 / 20–4124 / 13–3417 / 6–2511 / 1–188 / 0–15
RH %59 / 54–7559 / 55–7461 / 56–7162 / 55–6863 / 53–6762 / 51–6661 / 51–6662 / 54–6763 / 52–6762 / 53–7061 / 55–7360 / 55–75
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 844 grid cells on land that hold in-range records (1060 records in those cells; 1 more cell holds records but no land by the elevation layer, so those records sit at sea and the cell is left out), 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 900:3727 (44.975, 6.375). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -36.1 °C, 1st-percentile night -24.6 °C, 99th-percentile day 18.8 °C. 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 844 distinct grid cells holding 1060 of the 1061 in-range records (1 further cell with records at sea, by the elevation layer, left out); extremes and elevation at the typical cell 900:3727 (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 45.00_6.250, lapse-corrected +676 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 2613 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.
NativeGreat Britain, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Poland, Switzerland, France, Bulgaria, Italy, Romania, Yugoslavia, East European Russia, North European Russia, Ukraine, Libya, Altay, Buryatiya, Chita, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Tuva, West Siberia, Yakutskiya, Amur, Kamchatka, Khabarovsk, Kuril Is., Magadan, Primorye, Sakhalin, Kazakhstan, Kirgizistan, Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, North Caucasus, Transcaucasus, Afghanistan, China South-Central, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, China North-Central, Qinghai, Tibet, Xinjiang, Mongolia, Japan, Korea, East Himalaya, Nepal, Pakistan, West Himalaya, Aleutian Is., Alaska, Northwest Territories, Yukon, British Columbia, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico · 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 marker45.165, 6.406 · in the densest population, 510 records (34% 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 1509 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 1060 of them in the land cells it reads, of 1061 placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 1117 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 2 km away. 1 record outside the WCVP native range not used. 448 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 inside the densest 2° block of the 1509 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Gagea serotina, photograph 1did not loadGagea serotina, photograph 2did not loadGagea serotina, photograph 3did not loadGagea serotina, photograph 4did not loadGagea serotina, photograph 5did not loadGagea serotina, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: (c) Matt Berger, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); author not stated, no rights reserved · CC0 (3); (c) Trevor Van Loon, some rights reserved (CC BY).

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

Salix caesia Salix caesia Blue willow Photo: CC BY, Donald DavesneCarex bicolor Carex bicolor Bicoloured sedge Photo: CC BY, Antoine MARNATJuncus jacquinii Juncus jacquinii Chestnut Rush Photo: CC BY, Katrin SimonAchillea nana Achillea nana Asteraceae Photo: CC BY, Antoine ThivolleGeum reptans Geum reptans Creeping avens Photo: CC BY-SA, xulescu_gAchillea erba-rotta Achillea erba-rotta Simple-leaved Milfoil Photo: CC BY, Katrin Simon

Other Gagea 19 in the reference

Gagea amblyopetala Blunt-flowered Gagea Gagea bohemica Gagea bohemica Early star-of-bethlehem Photo: CC BY, Michal HonskusGagea bulbifera Gagea bulbifera Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, Yeskendir SatekovGagea chrysantha Gagea chrysantha Golden Gagea Photo: CC BY-SA, Lorenzo Peruzzi, Università di Pisa…Gagea fibrosa Gagea fibrosa Acute-flowered Star-of-Bethlehem Photo: CC BY, Eleftherios KatsillisGagea flavonutans Gagea flavonutans Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, Siddarth MachadoGagea foliosa Gagea foliosa Leafy Gagea Photo: CC BY-SA, XemenenduraGagea fragifera Gagea fragifera Star of Bethlehem Photo: CC BY, Antoine ThivolleGagea granulosa Gagea granulosa Granular gagea Photo: CC BY, Oleg KosterinGagea lutea Gagea lutea Yellow star-of-Bethlehem Photo: CC BY, Andrejus GaidamavičiusGagea minima Gagea minima Least Gagea Photo: CC BY, snaily_nailyGagea nakaiana Gagea nakaiana Oriental yellow gagea Photo: CC BY, Tatyana Petrenko all 20 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Anthericum serotinum; Bulbocodium alpinum; Bulbocodium autumnale; Bulbocodium serotinum; Cronyxium serotinum and 21 more. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Liliaceae
Described by
(L.) Ker Gawl.
Native to
Great Britain, Austria, Czechoslovakia +62
Wild records
1509 in range · 1117 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 2026-10-22
GBIF species record gbif.species answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF synonyms gbif.synonyms answeredasked 2026-10-22
GBIF common names gbif.vernacular answeredasked 2026-10-22names fetched 2026-10-22
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
Habitat climate climate answeredasked 2026-10-22
Daily extremes (NASA POWER) climate.extremes answeredasked 2026-10-22NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 45.00_6.250, lapse-corrected +676 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
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 2026-10-22
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 138 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

Cultifolio

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