It is endemic to a small mountainous region in the Sierra Madre Occidental, straddling the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora.

It grows in large colonies of hundreds of individuals, often near waterways and gulleys.

[1] The large, showy flowers appear in June, at the beginning of the summer rainy season.

Flowers are white and erect, with narrow perianth segments and a prominent corolla.

[1] The Pima peoples of the region report that these bulbs provided an emergency food source in years past, during famines that followed crop failures.