[Sidenote: =Grass Nuts. Blue Dicks. Covena.= _Brodiaèa capitàta_ =Blue, violet Spring California=]
All through the spring these lovely flowers grow abundantly all over the hills and fields of California. The slender stalks vary from a few inches to two feet tall. The flowers are usually purplish-blue, but vary from deep-violet to white and are rather translucent in texture. They measure over half an inch across and grow in a cluster of seven or eight flowers, with several membranous, purplish bracts at the base. There are six anthers. The three inner stamens are winged and form a crown in the throat of the flower-tube. These Brodiaeas last a long time in water and are great favorites everywhere. The little bulbs are edible and give the name of Grass Nuts. There are several other names, such as Cluster Lily and Hog-onion. The name Wild Hyacinth is poor, as it does not resemble a hyacinth in character. _B. capitàta var. pauciflòra_ of Arizona is similar, except that the bracts are white. Covena is the Arizona name.
[Sidenote: =Ookow= _Brodiaèa congésta_ =Blue, violet Spring, summer Wash., Oreg., Cal.=]
Much like the last, except that only three of the stamens have anthers and the stem is sometimes as much as five feet tall. This grows on open hills in the Coast Ranges.
[Illustration: Covena--Brodiaea capitata var. pauciflora.]
[Illustration: Ookow--Brodiaea congesta.]
[Sidenote: =Harvest Brodiaea= _Brodiaèa grandiflòra (Hookera coronaria)_ =Blue Summer Cal., Oreg., Wash.=]
In early June, at the time of the hay harvest, these handsome flowers, which look like clusters of little blue lilies, begin to appear among the dried grass of the hillsides and in open places in the woods. They vary in height from a few inches to over a foot and the number of flowers in a cluster also varies very much. Sometimes there are as many as ten of the beautiful blossoms, an inch or more long, with pedicels unequal in length and from one to four inches long, in a large cluster at the top of the stalk, with several, whitish, papery bracts at the base of the cluster. The color of the flowers is usually a deep bright blue shading to violet and the six divisions grow paler toward the base and have a brown stripe on the outside; the buds are greenish, striped with brown. The stamens are translucent white, three ordinary stamens, with long erect anthers, alternating with three without anthers, the latter tongue-shaped and petal-like. The leaves, which are thickish and about the same length as the stalk, have withered away before the flowers bloom. This plant very much resembles Ithuriel's Spear, _Triteleia laxa_, but three of the stamens are without anthers and the ovary is not on a long stalk. It is the commonest kind around San Francisco. B. _minor_ is much the same, but a smaller plant with fewer and smaller flowers. The three outer divisions are narrow, with pointed tips, and the inner blunt and broad, and the sterile stamens are notched and longer than the fertile ones. This grows on dry hills and plains in middle and southern California.