Fritillary by Jeroen de Jongh Photography

The wild lapwing flower (Fritillaria meleagris) is a bulbous plant in the lily family (Liliaceae). The flower has purple chequered petals. Sometimes the petals are even creamy white. The plant has a delicate stem with narrow leaves, which die a few months after flowering. The plants take eight years to flower. The seeds are relatively large and disperse floating on water. The plant is therefore dependent on floods and high water levels in winter to spread its seeds.

The wild lapwing flower is a rare bulbous plant found in the wild in the Netherlands, but is also found as a city plant. The plant can also be bought for use in gardens. The main natural growing place of the wild lapwing flower is along the banks of the Overijsselse Vecht and Zwarte Water near Hasselt (Overijssel). About eighty per cent of the Dutch wild lapwing flowers are found here. Traditionally, the lapwing flower was found in areas with clay-on-moorland, especially those areas that were flooded in winter. The plant has a poor resistance to changes in the water table.

The lapwing flower was appreciated as a flower crop early on. Around 1820-1830, so many 'peat tulips' were being picked that people began to realise that this prized wild plant might become extinct. Consequently, the very first nature law enacted in the Netherlands was about protecting the lapwing flower. Still today, this plant is threatened. Now not so much because of excessive picking, but because of excessive manure application. Unlike most flowers, the lapwing flower does not point its flower head towards the sun, but hangs down like a bell, For its pollination, this species depends mainly on large bumblebee species such as the earth bumblebee.