Snowdon Lily

For most of the year, the plant is visible only as long, curving, stiff, grass-like leaves, often protruding through cushions of other plants. The flowers appear from June onwards (despite the name serotina, meaning "late-flowering"), and are borne at the end of long stalks. The flowers themselves are white, with purple or reddish veins along the tepals. In Great Britain, G. serotina is an ice age relict, only found on a few inaccessible sites in Snowdonia National Park, Cwm Idwal being one such site, and seems to have developed in isolation since the glacial period. Although the total Welsh population may number fewer than 100 bulbs, the Welsh plants are genetically distinct from other populations of the same species, and are more diverse than those found in the Alps. While their inaccessibility protects the plants to a certain degree against grazing by sheep and trampling by hikers, they are likely to suffer under climate change, and it is believed that G. serotina will be the first plant to become extinct in Britain as a result of global warming. Plans are therefore being considered to introduce the plant to sites in Scotland, where it may survive in the longer term. It became a protected species in the UK in 1975 under the Conservation of Wild Creatures and Wild Plants Act.