Sea Daffodil season

I remember some time ago I saw a few posts with these flowers and I knew I had to find them (I think it was @fotostef that was showing them). I knew they did grow around here. I have seen the leaves in late spring and then dried-up flowers in the autumn. I even saw some seed pods, but I never got to see them in full bloom. And that is because they do bloom in the muddle of the summer, and I tend to avoid beaches at that time and go usually out of season.

Lo and behold!
I finally got them after years of being too year or too late.

Pancratium maritimum

And boy.. aren't they gorgeous!?

Pancratium maritimum, or sea daffodil, is a species of bulbous plant native to the Canary Islands and both sides of the Mediterranean region and Black Sea from Portugal, Morocco and the Balearic Islands east to Turkey, Syria, Israel and the Caucasus. In the parts of its range on the south Bulgarian and north Turkish and Georgian coasts of Black Sea. It is also naturalized in southern California, Bermuda and the Azores.
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Yes, they do like the warm climate. Having their bulb dug up deep in cool sand does help. With the sand moving with the wind very often, I only saw short parts of the leaves sticking out. In other places a long stem was exposed and bent down, not being able to hold starlight.





The large dune area was filled with flowers popping among the dry grasses and some beach succulents. It was quite a stunning and unexpected view, especially since there were no other flowers blooming there.

They are supposed to be scented, but since they are behind a little fence, I could not check it myself. Another time... hopefully :)

With the Atlantic Ocean view :)





All the white spots are the flowers.
I have to get to some place where I can walk among them. These dunes are part of the Santo Andre Nature Reserve and the whole area is protected.





Here is a lovely botanical illustration of the plant. There are also more photos (not mine) in the source link.



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