Giant White Fawn Lily Seeds (Erythronium oregonum)

This is one of the most deeply enigmatic wildflowers we’ve encountered, a mysterious forest dweller, blooming as a large, white, ghostly apparition for a brief window of time in the spring, then disappearing back underground to a seemingly infinitely-long lived hidden bulb. It’s like a dream, making you wonder if the plant was really ever there. Fawn lilies (which occur across the northern Pacific rim), are apparently edible, although we can’t imagine eating one. The giant white fawn lily, one of our more widely distributed species produces interesting leathery, reptilian leaves that are mottled in color – mostly green and brown – a kind of dappled camouflage perhaps, like a sleeping fawn in the forest. Occurring from British Columbia south to California, this plant typically appears on rocky ground in pristine coast range mountains, rain forests, and forest clearings. Yet, it probably once was more common elsewhere – in breezy low elevation meadows and prairies –places without summer