Ixiolirion tataricum (Pall.) Schult. & Schult. fil.

Common in wheat and grain fields in the lower northern parts of the country. Worth cultivating for its attractive flowers.

Bulbs globose, c. 2 cm in diameter, covered with brownish scales. Plants up to 1 m tall. Leaves c. 5 mm broad. Flowers in 2-6 umbellate clusters, bracteate. Bracts up to 1 cm long with broad membranous margins. Pedicels 1-2 cm long. Tepals free, 2-3 5 cm long, blue-violet, linear to lanceolate, 3-veined, long acuminate. Stamens free, unequal in length, filaments purple, free to the base; anthers slightly sagittate, c. 1 mm long. Style filiform, purple, stigmas 3, purple. Fruit capsular, oblong to clavate; seeds many.

Corms ovoid, 1.5--2.5 × 2(--2.5) cm; tunic brown, longitudinally striate. Basal leaves usually 3--8, linear. Flowering stem 10--40 cm, base with 1--3 smaller leaves; bracts smaller than involucres, membranous. Inflorescence an umbel or short raceme, 3--6-flowered, sometimes basal leaf axil of flowering stem with 1--3 additional flowers; involucres 2 or 3, white or green, lanceolate, to 3.5 cm, membranous, apex acuminate and aristate. Pedicels unequal. Perianth azure to dark violet or light blue; segments spreading, free, sometimes laxly connivent proximally into a ca. 1 cm long pseudotube, oblanceolate to narrowly so, 2--3.5 cm × 1--7 mm, veins 3--5 at middle, apex subacute. Stamens unequal, outer ones longer than inner; filament purple, subfiliform, glabrous; anther basifixed, straight. Fl. Apr--Jun.

Distribution: Egypt, Turkey to Central Asia, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Fl. Per.: March-April.

Valleys, stony slopes, sandy places, waste grasslands. N Xinjiang [Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Turkmenistan].