It is a member of the Arisaema triphyllum complex, a group of four or five closely related taxa in eastern North America.

The specific name triphyllum means "three-leaved",[3] a characteristic feature of the species, which is also referred to as Indian turnip, bog onion, and brown dragon.

[4] Arisaema triphyllum sensu lato is a herbaceous, perennial, flowering plant growing from a corm.

It typically grows up to two feet (61 cm) tall,[5] but populations in Georgia and Florida are known to reach almost twice that height.

Due to this sex-change lifecycle, this species is sometimes called colloquially as Jack or Jill in the pulpit [8][9][10] or Jill-in-the-pulpit.

[11][12] The unripe fruits are smooth, shiny green berries (each 1 cm wide) clustered around the thickened spadix.

Fruits ripen in the late summer and early fall, turning a conspicuous bright red color.

Each berry typically produces 1–5 seeds, which are white to light tan, rounded, often with flattened edges and a short sharp point at the top.

If the seeds are freed from the berry, they will germinate the next spring, producing seedlings each with a single rounded leaf.

To identify an individual to species, ask the following questions (in order): Although the taxa are morphologically distinct, identification may be difficult, especially from herbarium specimens where the required characters are often lost in pressing and drying.

[1] The name Arisaema triphyllum (L.) Schott is widely used today despite a taxonomic disruption that prevailed during the second half of the twentieth century.

",[20] arguing that the type described by Linnaeus was in fact Arisaema pusillum, a claim that destabilized the existing nomenclature.

[29][4][30][31][32][33][34] Still others, including the influential Flora of North America, lump all of the taxa into a single species concept.

[35][36] Within the genus Arisaema, A. triphyllum is classified in the section Pedatisecta and is most closely related to Asian species such as A. amurense.

[37] Arisaema triphyllum sensu lato is wide-ranging across eastern North America, from Nova Scotia in the northeast to Florida in the southeast, stretching westward across the Mississippi River valley into the Great Plains, from Texas in the southwest to Manitoba in the northwest.

[27][38][26] It is common throughout most of its range, occurring in most counties in over 30 states in the eastern U.S.[39] Less is known about the distribution of Arisaema triphyllum sensu stricto.

[9] [43] Thus the Jill-in-the-pulpit is a rare femme fatale in the plant world: luring the gnats in with scent, but ultimately killing the pollinators in a death trap.

[46] Individuals from this population have glaucous leaves (like A. triphyllum) and strongly fluted spathes (like A. stewardsonii), growing in dry sandy soil (like neither species).

Arisaemas are in the same plant family as the anthuriums, aglaonemas, alocasias, colocasias, dieffenbachias, monsteras and philodendrons (among numerous others)— all known as "dumb-canes"—and carry the shared side-effect of an enflamed upper respiratory/digestive system upon ingestion.