Unknown autumn flowering Allium from S Turkey?

[Kees Jan]

Hello,

I'm attaching two pics of an autumn flowering Allium, photographed in the SW of Hatay province in S Turkey, October 2008. I think the plants were about 40cm tall. Not a wildly exciting plant for the garden, but of botanical interest.

It seems to be similar to Allium paniculatum, but the flowering time (mid-October) would be very late for this species (normally may-august). It looks very similar to the picture of the related Allium dentiferum at http://www.marz-kreations.com/WildPlants/LILI/Allium_dentiferum.html I'm not sure if dentiferum grows as far east as Hatay province though, or what separates it from paniculatum.

Any suggestions or information would be much appreciated!

Kees Jan

[Oron Peri]

Kees,

I would suggest more for the A. tardans group, I say group because this species has a wide distribution in
most of the E. Mediterranean Islands, Greece and Turkey.

To my knowledge there are four Allium Species that flower in the area in autumn:
A. tardans [distribution as above]
A. autumnale [Cyprus]
A. tardiflorum [Israel]
A. callimischon [Greece, Turkey]
the first three are very similar in appearance and hard to tell a part.

I must say that your Allium has more flowers than all the other I mentioned, was it a common characteristic of the others too?

They are all closely related to A. paniculatum [in bloom in early summer: June, July].
A. tardiflorum from Israel was treated in the past as a ssp. of A. paniculatum as well as A. dentiferum [you have mentioned].