Scilla bithynica Boiss.

Squill, Turkish Squill

Climate known 53 photographs

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Scilla bithynica, the Turkish squill, is a species of flowering plant in the genus Scilla, native to Bulgaria and Turkey. It has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.

Text from Wikipedia, “Scilla bithynica”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Scilla

Scilla is a genus of about 30 to 80 species of bulb-forming perennial herbaceous plants in the family Asparagaceae, subfamily Scilloideae. Sometimes called the squills in English, they are native to woodlands, subalpine meadows, and seashores throughout Europe, Africa and the Middle East. A few species are also naturalized in Australasia and North America. More on Wikipedia ›

The opening of Wikipedia, “Scilla”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family

Asparagaceae

Described by

Boiss.

Native to

Bulgaria, Turkey

Wild records

9 in range· 9 open

At a glance

Warmest month

25°C

Aug, mean day; nights 21 °C (CHELSA)

Rain

630mm/yr

12 wet months · peak Nov 82 mm (CHELSA)

Light

9–43DLI

mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)

In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person

Rain rule: a winter growing season, September to March in the northern hemisphere (September to March at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 630 mm a year, wettest November at 82 mm, driest August at 33 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 9 to 43 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -6.2 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Pfosseria bithynica (Boiss.) Speta; Scilla bithynica subsp. linea Speta; Scilla bithynica subsp. paphlagonica Speta; Scilla bithynica subsp. radkae (Davidov) Speta; Scilla radkae Davidov.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a winter growing season, September to March in the northern hemisphere (September to March at the habitat, northern).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a winter growing season: 70% of the year's rain (443 mm of 630 mm) falls in September to March, cooler than the year (wet-season mean 9.9 °C against a yearly mean of 13.5 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: March to September.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 630 mm a year, wettest November at 82 mm, driest August at 33 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

630 mm a year at the habitat, 443 mm of it September to March. Wettest month November at 82 mm, driest August at 33 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 572 mm to 643 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 9 to 43 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 9 to 43 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -6.2 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -6.2 °C, the absolute minimum -19.9 °C, about 46 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 34.6 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 2.7 °C in February (across the envelope cells 1.5 °C to 3.0 °C), warmest day 24.8 °C in August (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -6.2 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 60 to 62% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 5 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale

Figures by month

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
Day °C	7 / 6–7	7 / 7–7	9 / 9–9	13 / 13–13	18 / 17–18	23 / 22–23	25 / 25–25	25 / 25–25	22 / 21–22	17 / 17–17	12 / 12–13	8 / 8–9
Night °C	3 / 2–3	3 / 2–3	5 / 4–5	9 / 8–9	14 / 13–14	18 / 17–18	21 / 20–21	21 / 20–21	18 / 17–18	14 / 12–14	9 / 7–9	5 / 3–5
Rain mm	58 / 49–60	47 / 41–49	55 / 48–56	47 / 44–48	34 / 33–35	37 / 35–39	36 / 34–37	33 / 32–34	50 / 48–54	75 / 62–78	82 / 71–85	76 / 63–78
DLI	11 / 10–11	16 / 16–17	24 / 23–24	34 / 33–34	40 / 40–40	43 / 43–43	43 / 43–43	38 / 38–38	28 / 28–29	19 / 18–19	12 / 12–12	9 / 9–9
RH %	62 / 61–63	61 / 60–61	60 / 60–61	61 / 60–62	62 / 61–63	61 / 60–62	61 / 60–61	61 / 60–62	60 / 60–61	61 / 60–62	62 / 61–62	62 / 61–63

Each figure is the median across the 5 grid cells holding the 9 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 953:4154 (42.325, 27.725). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -19.9 °C, 1st-percentile night -6.2 °C, 99th-percentile day 34.6 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 5 distinct grid cells holding the 9 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 953:4154 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 42.50_27.500, lapse-corrected -34 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 48 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.

Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.

NativeBulgaria, Turkey· introduced: Great Britain, Ireland, East Aegean Is.

Kew's description“bulbous geophyte” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here

Map marker42.293, 27.757 · in the densest population, 9 records (100% of those in range)

Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 9 georeferenced records inside the native range, all openly licensed and shown on the map. 120 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. Under a dozen records: treat the map and the climate as indicative.

The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 9 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Photographs: (c) Mark Wall, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) katunchik, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4); (c) Jon Mortin, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Photographs: iNaturalist did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Scilla bithynica, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Occurrence Download

GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility

Occurrence Download

GBIF.org User (2026) · Global Biodiversity Information Facility

Scilla bithynica Boiss.

Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (2026)

Scilla bithynica Boiss.