Earth brodiaea is an erect perennial growing from a dark-brown, fibrous-coated, subspheric corm.  The leaves are basal, linear grasslike, generally 3-5, and about as long as the flowering scapes.  The scapes bear umbels usually subtended by scarious bracts and the pedicels are 3/4" to 3-1/2" long.  The perianth is lilac to blue-violet, the tube approximately 1/2" long, narrowly-bell-to-funnel shaped, with six ascending lobes in two petal-like whorls, the inner lobes wider.  The tips of the lobes are slightly recurved.  There are three stamens and up to three staminodes that are erect and not bent toward the stamens, and the style is up to 3/8" long with a three-lobed stigma. Earth brodiaea occupies slopes and flats in valley grassland and foothill woodland to about 5000', blooming from April to June.  These pictures were taken at the Santa Rosa Plateau Ecological Reserve. A species which has been widely identified in Southern California floral guides as Brodiaea jolonensis is almost certainly this species.  See the online analysis by Tom Chester and Wayne Armstrong here.

Click here for Latin name derivations: 1) Brodiaea 2) terrestris 3) kernensis.
Pronunciation: BRO-dee-a ter-ES-tris ker-NEN-sis.
Click here for Botanical Term Meanings.