Friday Fabulous Flower - Tigerlily

This week’s Friday Fabulous Flower is being posted on Thursday because the Phactor is off on a short, local botanical geek tour and quite possibly some component will be blogged next week. Stay tuned. Although it seems rather early in June everything else is early so why should this tiger lily be any different. Standing nearly 6 feet tall with vividly orange flowers this is without question one of my favorite lilies (Lilium lancifolium – formerly Lilium tigrinum). Now why a lily with heavily spotted flowers would be called “tiger” rather than say “leopard” raises an interesting question. It isn’t striped. My companion in gardening gets credit for rescuing this beastly lily from an overgrown hedgerow where it had not flowered in years so what it was precisely was unknown to her. With a couple of years in a better location, it’s vigor restored, the tiger now stands guard next to our garden gate. Enjoy.