Prosartes, commonly called fairybells, is a small genus of rhizomatous herbaceous perennials native to North America, placed in the family Colchicaceae within the order Liliales. The genus is characterized by bell-shaped, pendent (hanging) flowers and a spreading, rhizomatous growth habit typical of woodland understory plants.
For several decades, the plants now assigned to Prosartes were treated as part of Disporum, a genus otherwise distributed across Asia. Studies of morphology, cytology, and genetic analysis revealed the North American plants to be sufficiently distinct from the Asian species to merit their own genus, and in 1995 the two groups began to be recognized separately. Prosartes comprised five species until 2010, when Prosartes parvifolia — long considered a variety of P. hookeri or possibly a hybrid — was acknowledged as a distinct sixth species.
The genus currently includes six species distributed across a wide arc of North America. Notable members include Prosartes hookeri (drops of gold), found in California, the Pacific Northwest, and isolated populations as far east as the Black Hills and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan; Prosartes smithii (largeflower fairybells), ranging along the West Coast from Vancouver Island to San Francisco Bay; Prosartes trachycarpa (roughfruit fairybells), distributed through the western United States and central and western Canada; and Prosartes lanuginosa (yellow mandarin or fairybells), found in the Appalachians, Ozarks, and Ontario. Prosartes maculata (spotted mandarin) is restricted to the southern Appalachians.
Taxonomy Notes
Prosartes was long included within the Asian genus Disporum, but morphological, cytological, and genetic studies demonstrated that the North American species form a distinct lineage, and the two groups were separated in 1995. The genus belongs to the family Colchicaceae in the order Liliales. Prosartes parvifolia, previously treated as a variant of P. hookeri or a hybrid, was recognized as a distinct species in 2010, bringing the total to six species.
Distribution
Prosartes is endemic to North America. Species occur across a broad latitudinal range: from California and the Pacific Northwest north to Vancouver Island, east through the Rocky Mountain region to the Black Hills, across the central and western Canadian provinces, and east to the Appalachians, Ozarks, and Ontario. One species (P. maculata) is restricted to the southern Appalachians.
Ecology
Prosartes species are woodland herbs of temperate forests, growing as understory plants in moist, shaded habitats. Their rhizomatous growth habit allows spread through forest-floor litter, and their pendent, bell-shaped flowers are characteristic of spring-blooming woodland genera in the Liliales.
