Edible Camas Bulbs For Sale

Be very sure of your identification as there is a similar plant the death camas that looks close enough to a blue camas to keep you on your toes.

Edible camas bulbs for sale. The sweet bulbs of the common camas are considered by many to be a northwest native food delicacy. Slow cooking causes the sugars to caramelize turning them nearly black. These are all blue camas bulbs. The leaves are long.

The taste is often compared to a baked pear fig or sweet potato and can even used to sweeten. Great camas is a stunning and iconic northwest wildflower with a sweet edible bulb and blue purple flowers. Great camas flowers by mid may setting seed and then going dormant into it s underground bulb until emerging the next spring. Camassia bloom brilliant blue purple and crisp white flowers.

Camas bulbs are native to north america and there are several varieties all blue. Camas lily is a lovely native bulb species that blooms in late spring with clear blue flowers. Western north america in areas of winter wet meadows swales depressions in prairies and on moist slopes zones 4 8. Common camas flowers by mid may setting seed and then going dormant into it s underground bulb until emerging the next spring.

Cool history as a food staple for native americans. Edible camas bulbs and is toxic. Camassia quamash and camassia leichtlinii common name. First documented by lewis and clark in the cascade mountains where the bulb was an important food plant for the native americans this lovely wildflower is very cold hardy and long lived.

Be sure of your identification of camas bulbs before eating them. Camas indian hyacinth origin. Death camas bulbs are smaller than those of blue camas which can get as large as 1 1 2 inches across the size of a small onion. The bulb from which it grows is one of the largest of the group of geophytes called indian potatoes it can be grown harvested and eaten in a somewhat similar manner to other.

The size of the bulbs is also a relative indicator although not a super reliable one. Common camas is a stout robust plant 12 28 inches 30 70 cm tall with a dense inflorescence. The sweet bulbs of the great camas are considered by many to be a northwest native food. The way to avoid this is to cook the bulbs for an extended period of time causing the inulin sugars to convert to fructose a digestible sugar.

Hard to find yet so easy to grow. Historically camas root was cooked in an earthen oven for several days. It is a perennial herb that grows from an edible bulb. Members of the lily family camas have the signature strap like leaves with the flowering stem rising above the graceful cascade.

Probably one of the most well known native rootfoods throughout the west blue camas turns fields and prairies to a sea of striking blue purple flowers from april to june.