FLOWERS 61 



wide. They are comparatively rare, having been in- 

 troduced from the Mississippi Valley, but I have 

 seen them so thick it was an effort to push your way 

 through a growth of them. 



If in your July saunterings you should pass by 

 Porcupine Meadows on the Tioga Road in Yosem- 

 ite, leave your car and walk into the rather boggy 

 meadows. Should the wonderful six-petaled star- 

 shaped Camass flowers be open you might think a 

 bit of sky had come to earth, so blue are they! This 

 should be in the afternoon. At other hours they 

 would be invisible, so tight is each flower's folding. 

 The plant is a foot or two high, a spike with several 

 blossoms open at the same time. They wilt quickly, 

 but picking a few younger spikes and keeping them 

 in moist paper, I took them to my laboratory and 

 the lapse-time camera caught them opening at 2 P.M. 

 the next day, closing by four. The Mono Indians are 

 very fond of the bulbs as food, so fond of them that 

 in early days it led to numerous wars with the valley 

 tribes, the dispute being who had the right to gather 

 them. Care should be taken not to include in your 

 repast bulbs of the white Death Camass in com- 

 parison with which a brew of the bitter hemlock 

 would be but faintly fatal. 



The Knot Weed, or Alpine Smartweed, is another 

 one of the high mountain meadow flowers, which 



