This is a Fremont’s death camas. That seems like a pretty sinister name for an ordinary little wildflower, but perhaps it’s not so ordinary after all:

All parts of the plant contain a toxic alkaloid that some consider more potent than strychnine. Recent evidence suggests that the Lewis and Clark expedition accidentally ate death camas bulbs ground into a bread. This halted the entire expedition while the soldiers recovered.

Recovered? Perhaps it should be renamed the Fremont’s unpleasantness camas.

April 20, 2019 — Laguna Coast Wilderness Park, Orange County, California

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