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Tulipa montana; photograph Burkhard Mücke, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SABurkhard Mücke, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Tulipa montana Lindl.

Liliaceae · Turkmenistan, Iran · listed by its genus as a bulb, tuber or caudex

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Tulipa montana, photograph Esther Westerveld from Haarlemmermeer, Nederland, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia CommonsTulipa montana, photograph Burkhard Mücke, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia CommonsTulipa montana, photograph Burkhard Mücke, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia CommonsTulipa montana, photograph KENPEI, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia CommonsTulipa montana, photograph Ulimw, CC0, via Wikimedia CommonsTulipa montana, photograph Ulimw, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons 10 photographs ›
Habitat figures
Cold floor (1 night in 100)
-14.7°C
Record low -25.1 °C in 44 years, at a typical spot in the range NASA POWER
Warmest month, mean daily high
29°C
Jul at the habitat CHELSA
Rain a year (median across the range)
452mm
8 months of 25 mm or more in the median year CHELSA
Open-sky light
18–48DLI
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 winters: the rain comes December to May, with nights below freezing; no growing season read. rain rule, CHELSA
Northern hemisphere unless you set your site. The chart is in the habitat's months.

Summary

Tulipa montana is a species of tulip native to the mountains of Iran and Turkmenistan. With its deep red petals (there is also a yellow morph) it has been proposed as a candidate for the Biblical Rose of Sharon, whose identity is unknown.

Quoted from Wikipedia, "Tulipa montana", CC BY-SA 4.0.

About the genus · Tulipa

Tulips are spring-blooming perennial herbaceous bulbiferous geophytes in the Tulipa genus. Their flowers are usually large, showy, and brightly coloured, generally red, orange, pink, yellow, or white. They often have a different coloured blotch at the base of the tepals, internally. More on Wikipedia ›

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

Cultivation

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

Seasons

The rain rule reads a rainy season and no growing season: 70% of the median year's rain (379 mm of 494 mm) falls in December to May, the cooler part of the year, but the mean nightly low is below freezing in February, March, April and January, so the rule reads no growing season from it. Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: June to November.

Rain

494 mm in the median year at the habitat, 379 mm of it December to May. Wettest month March at 81 mm, driest month August at 7 mm. Across the grid cells of the range the year's total runs 325 mm to 1,013 mm, the 10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year. The median of the cells' own yearly totals, 452 mm, is the year's rain at the top of the page; the 494 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: 18 to 48 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 14, the highest 90th-percentile month 50).

Warmth and air
Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at a typical spot in the range is -14.7 °C, the absolute minimum -25.1 °C, 5,375 frost nights in 44 years, 122.2 a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 32.6 °C. Monthly means: the coldest month's mean nightly low -9.3 °C in January (across the grid cells of the range -17.5 °C to -3.5 °C), the warmest month's mean daily high 28.9 °C in July (median year across the grid cells of the range, CHELSA). Cold floor: -14.7 °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: 43 to 55% 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 -419 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 genus Tulipa 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 Tulipa montana through the yearWarmest month July, mean daily high 29 °C; coldest month January, mean nightly low -9.3 °C; 494 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.-30°-20°-10°0°10°20°30°40°frost32.6° 99th-percentile day, NASA POWER-25.1° lowest night in 44 years, NASA POWER°C · day and nightcold quarter0255075100125mm rainDLI 18–48RH 43–55%JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain medians and 10th–90th percentile across 19 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-1 / -10–61 / -8–76 / -4–1213 / 4–1919 / 11–2425 / 19–3029 / 21–3328 / 21–3224 / 17–2716 / 9–219 / 0–142 / -7–8
Night °C-9 / -18–-4-8 / -16–-3-4 / -11–13 / -4–88 / 2–1413 / 9–1916 / 12–2216 / 11–2112 / 7–166 / 0–100 / -8–4-6 / -15–-1
Rain mm59 / 25–9562 / 31–9981 / 44–12068 / 50–11551 / 30–8914 / 6–3910 / 6–387 / 3–368 / 4–2930 / 15–8146 / 28–9958 / 24–96
DLI20 / 16–2627 / 22–3334 / 29–4040 / 36–4445 / 41–4748 / 44–5047 / 43–4945 / 40–4738 / 33–4129 / 24–3121 / 17–2518 / 14–23
RH %54 / 52–5754 / 52–5855 / 52–5852 / 50–5649 / 44–5545 / 38–5245 / 38–5243 / 38–5244 / 38–5250 / 46–5353 / 51–5554 / 52–57
How this section is made
Each figure is the median across the 19 grid cells holding the 19 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 1081:4620 (35.925, 51.025). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -25.1 °C, 1st-percentile night -14.7 °C, 99th-percentile day 32.6 °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 19 distinct grid cells holding 19 of the 19 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 1081:4620 (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 36.00_51.250, lapse-corrected -419 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 2010 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.
NativeTurkmenistan, Iran · 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 marker35.85, 51.383 · in the densest population, 14 records (52% of those in range)
Kew's description“bulbous geophyte” · “temperate” · quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Evidence usedThe map marker rests on all 27 georeferenced records inside the native range; the climate across the range on the 19 of them placed to within 10 km; the map shows only the 14 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 7 km away. 6 records outside the WCVP native range not used. 8 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 27 in-range records; it decides nothing. Records outside the native range, living specimens and records marked introduced are not used; which records count.

Photographs

Tulipa montana, photograph 1did not loadTulipa montana, photograph 2did not loadTulipa montana, photograph 3did not loadTulipa montana, photograph 4did not loadTulipa montana, photograph 5did not loadTulipa montana, photograph 6did not load

Photographs: Esther Westerveld from Haarlemmermeer, Nederland, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons; Burkhard Mücke, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons (2); KENPEI, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons; Ulimw, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons (2).

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

Colutea persica Colutea persica Fabaceae Photo: CC BY, A. BarraGentiana olivieri Gentiana olivieri Gentianaceae Photo: CC BY, Igor Karyakin Eryngium billardierei Apiaceae Veronica cinerea Veronica cinerea Ash-coloured speedwell Photo: CC0, author not statedFritillaria stenanthera Fritillaria stenanthera Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, Evgeniy MeykeTulipa greigii Tulipa greigii Liliaceae Photo: CC BY-SA, Анатолий Озерной /Anatoly Ozernoy

Other Tulipa 51 in the reference

Tulipa agenensis Tulipa agenensis Eyed Tulip Photo: CC BY, Antoine ThivolleTulipa alberti Tulipa alberti Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, ivansemenkovTulipa aleppensis Tulipa aleppensis Liliaceae Photo: CC0, DûrzanTulipa altaica Tulipa altaica Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, Maxim Shashkov Tulipa anisophylla Liliaceae Tulipa armena Tulipa armena Armenian Tulip Photo: CC BY-SA, ChaojokerTulipa biflora Tulipa biflora Biflora tulip Photo: CC BY, Jesenia K.Tulipa bifloriformis Tulipa bifloriformis Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, Artem Abdukakharov Tulipa carinata Liliaceae Tulipa clusiana Tulipa clusiana Lady tulip Photo: CC0, author not statedTulipa cretica Tulipa cretica Cretan Tulip Photo: CC BY, Eleftherios KatsillisTulipa dasystemon Tulipa dasystemon Liliaceae Photo: CC BY, kirinzi all 52 ›

Names & registers

Also known as Tulipa biebersteiniana var. aurantiaca; Tulipa chrysantha; Tulipa giselae; Tulipa linifolia f. chrysantha; Tulipa montana var. chrysantha and 2 more. (GBIF Backbone)

GBIFPOWOIPNIWFOWikidataWikipediaiNaturalist

The record

Family
Liliaceae
Described by
Lindl.
Native to
Turkmenistan, Iran
Wild records
27 in range · 14 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 36.00_51.250, lapse-corrected -419 m at 6.5 °C/km
Wikidata wikidata answeredasked 2026-10-22
Wikipedia wikipedia answeredasked 2026-10-22
iNaturalist photographs, wild inat.photos.wild nothing to reportasked 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 nothing to reportasked 2026-10-22
Wikimedia Commons commons 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 12 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.

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