RHH's photos with the keyword: common camas

Common Camas is one of our spring wildflowers, usually a deep blue, but occasionally white. This was photographed near our home last spring.

One white Camas among the more common blue forms. Camas is a common wildflower in our area, growing in wet areas and filling meadows with color. It has an edible bulb that was an important food source for the native peoples.

This is the ordinary blue color of Common Camas, a very common spring wildflower in our area. I saw it yesterday in every damp area near our home while out walking. This example was photographed near Hog Lake.

Camas was an important plant to the native Americans who used the bulbs for food. It grows in wetter areas on the prairies and is usually blue but can be found in pink and white as well. We found a few white flowers when we were at Hog Lake this past week.

Common Camas is a beautiful prairie wildflower of the Pacific Northwest but was an important food plant as well for native Americans. It's sweet bulbs could be roasted or steamed and eaten or ground into a powder and used as a sweetener or flour. These were photographed near our home where it grows in abundance.

These are the flowers of Common Camas, a wildflower that grows near our home.

These are the buds and a flower of Common Camas, a wildflower of the Pacific Northwest. They grow in wet areas near our home and often cover whole fields with a blue blanket in the spring.

Common Camas is well named since it is one of most common wildflowers in the Pacific Northwest. We have seen fields and prairies covered with thousands of them in bloom. They were also an important food source for native Americans who dug and ate the bulbs. These were photographed in eastern Washington, but they grow west of the mountains as well.

The Common Camas, Camassia quamash, was an important food source for the native Americans who dug the bulbs in the autumn, roasted or boiled them and sometimes ground them up for flour. These were photographed in Washington Park on Fidalgo Island, where they are common, but there are other areas where they cover whole meadows.

A beautiful spring wildflower which was once an important food source for native Americans. The bulbs were harvested, roasted or boiled or dried and pounded into flower. These were photographed on Pass Island in Deception Pass, but we have seen them all over the Pacific Northwest, sometimes covering fields with their blooms.

These were not open yet when we visited Sharpe Park last spring, but they are a very common wildflower here in the Pacific Northwest and an important food source for the native Americans. We have seen them growing in fields by the thousands and probably in areas that were carefully harvested in years past. The bulbs are the edible part of the plant but one must be sure what one is eating since the Death Camas has similar looking plant and bulb, though the flowers are very different. These were photographed on the granite balds at Sares Head in Sharpe Park. The flowers are pictured in the inset photo.

Photographed in a very wet, boggy area near Medical Lake, Washington. Wikipedia gives this information: "The Quamash was a food source for many native peoples in the western United States and Canada. After being harvested in the autumn, once the flowers have withered, the bulbs were pit-roasted or boiled. A pit-cooked camas bulb looks and tastes something like baked sweet potato, but sweeter, and with more crystalline fibers due to the presence of inulin in the bulbs. When dried, the bulbs could be pounded into flour. Native American tribes who ate camas include the Nez Perce, Cree, Coast Salish, Lummi, and Blackfoot tribes, among many others. Camas bulbs contributed to the survival of members of the expedition of Lewis and Clark (1804-1806). Though the once-immense spreads of camas lands have diminished because of modern developments and agriculture, numerous Camas prairies and marshes may still be seen today. In the Great Basin, expanded settlement by whites accompanied by turning cattle and hogs onto camas prairies greatly diminished food available to native tribes and increased tension between Native Americans and settlers and travelers. Warning: While Camassia species are edible and nutritious, the white-flowered Deathcamas species (which are not the genus Camassia, but part of the genus Zigadenus) that grow in the same areas are toxic, and the bulbs are quite similar. It is easiest to tell the plants apart when they are in flower."

This photo is completely untouched. It was taken later in the day as the sun was setting and the strong blues must be the result of the lighting. They certainly are not the result of any tweaking in Photoshop. The picture shows the marshy area near Medical Lake, Washington, where we found thousands of Common Camas growing, the flower shown below. Some of them can be seen in the photo and the blue in the background is a large drift of them. More information on the Common Camas and its use as food by the Indians and early settlers can be found in the description of the flower below. They are not as common as they used to be, however, as a result of the drainage of marshes and wetlands.