Species
+

Camassia quamash (Pursh) Greene

Camas, Common Camash, Qémʼes, Qʷəɬúʔəl

Climate known 46 photographs
Add one to my plants Sow seed

Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Camassia quamash, commonly known as camas, kwetlal, small camas, common camas, common camash or quamash, is a perennial herb. It is native to western North America in large areas of southern Canada and the northwestern United States.

Text from Wikipedia, “Camassia quamash”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Camassia

Camassia is a genus of plants in the asparagus family native to North America. Common names include camas, quamash, Indian hyacinth, camash, and wild hyacinth.

Text from Wikipedia, “Camassia”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Asparagaceae
Described by
(Pursh) Greene
Native to
Alberta, British Columbia, Idaho +7
Wild records
1658 in range· 520 open

At a glance

Warmest month
27°C
Jul, mean day; nights 13 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
888mm/yr
10 wet months · peak Dec 132 mm (CHELSA)
Light
8–48DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: a winter growing season, October to March in the northern hemisphere (October to March at the habitat, northern). Habitat rain 888 mm a year, wettest December at 132 mm, driest July at 20 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 8 to 48 mol/m²/day. Cold floor -18.4 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Anthericum quamash (Pursh) Steud.; Camassia leichtlinii var. watsonii M.E.Jones; Camassia quamash f. quamash; Phalangium quamash Pursh; Quamasia quamash (Pursh) Coville.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a winter growing season, October to March in the northern hemisphere (October to March at the habitat, northern).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a winter growing season: 70% of the year's rain (626 mm of 888 mm) falls in October to March, cooler than the year (wet-season mean 2.8 °C against a yearly mean of 8.7 °C). Months are the habitat's, northern hemisphere; shifted six months for a southern-hemisphere collection: April to September.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 888 mm a year, wettest December at 132 mm, driest July at 20 mm (habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

888 mm a year at the habitat, 626 mm of it October to March. Wettest month December at 132 mm, driest July at 20 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 462 mm to 1650 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, northern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 8 to 48 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 8 to 48 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 6, the highest 90th-percentile month 52).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor -18.4 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is -18.4 °C, the absolute minimum -32.6 °C, about 144 frost nights a year (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 35.0 °C. Monthly means: coldest night -4.7 °C in December (across the envelope cells -10.6 °C to 2.9 °C), warmest day 26.6 °C in July (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: -18.4 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 50 to 64% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 3 °C in Dec to 27 °C in Jul; mean night from -5 °C in Dec to 13 °C in Aug. The cold quarter, Nov to Jan, is the three months around the coldest night. 888 mm of rain a year, most in Dec. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 837 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was -32.6 °C and the 99th-percentile day 35.0 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.-40°-20°20°40°frost35.0° 99th-percentile day (undated)-32.6° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter050100150200250300mm rainDLI 8–48RH 50–64 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 837 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C3 / -2–95 / 0–119 / 4–1312 / 8–1617 / 13–2021 / 17–2427 / 20–2927 / 21–2922 / 17–2515 / 11–187 / 2–123 / -3–8
Night °C-4 / -10–3-4 / -9–3-1 / -6–52 / -3–76 / 1–910 / 5–1213 / 9–1513 / 9–1510 / 5–125 / 0–9-1 / -6–6-5 / -11–3
Rain mm119 / 44–25993 / 37–20388 / 41–18667 / 37–12066 / 38–10250 / 22–9220 / 8–4521 / 8–4138 / 17–6269 / 33–137125 / 51–258132 / 54–288
DLI10 / 7–1516 / 13–2224 / 20–3134 / 29–4041 / 35–4644 / 38–5148 / 41–5242 / 36–4731 / 27–3719 / 15–2610 / 8–168 / 6–13
RH %64 / 59–6862 / 58–6560 / 57–6457 / 54–6255 / 51–6154 / 47–6050 / 43–5950 / 43–6052 / 45–6157 / 50–6463 / 57–6864 / 60–68

Each figure is the median across the 837 grid cells holding the 1596 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 851:1249 (47.425, -117.525). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum -32.6 °C, 1st-percentile night -18.4 °C, 99th-percentile day 35.0 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 837 distinct grid cells holding the 1596 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 851:1249 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell 47.50_-117.500, lapse-corrected -33 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 699 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeAlberta, British Columbia, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, California, Nevada, Utah
Kew's description“bulbous geophyte” · “temperate”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker48.41, -123.304 · in the densest population, 906 records (55% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 1658 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 520 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 8 km away. 14 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 62 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population inside the densest 2° block of the 1658 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Camassia quamashCamassia quamashCamassia quamashCamassia quamashCamassia quamashCamassia quamashCamassia quamashCamassia quamash

Photographs: no rights reserved · CC0; (c) Peter L Achuff, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) Abby Hyde, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Ed Alverson, some rights reserved (CC BY) (4).

Photographs: iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Camassia quamash, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Plant Responese to the Light Penetrating Snow
Steven G. Richardson, Frank B. Salisbury (1977) · Ecology
Control of Scot's broom (Cytisus scoparius (L.) Link.): The relative conservation merits of pulling versus cutting
Joel G. Ussery, Pam G. Krannitz (1998) · Research Exchange (Washington State University)
Insect Visitation to Wildflowers in the Endangered Garry Oak, Quercus garryana, Ecosystem of British Columbia
Amy L. Parachnowitsch, Elizabeth Elle (2005) · The Canadian Field-Naturalist
Connecting people, plants and place: A native plant society's journey towards a community of practice
Brenda R. Beckwith, Eva Johansson, Valerie J. Huff (2022) · People and Nature
Harvesting strategies as evidence for 4000 years of camas ( Camassia quamash ) management in the North American Columbia Plateau
Molly Carney, Shannon Tushingham, Tara McLaughlin, Jade d’Alpoim Guedes (2021) · Royal Society Open Science
Ecosystem use by indigenous people in an Oregon coastal landscape
Donald B. Zobel (2002) · Research Exchange (Washington State University)
Forgotten forbs: Standard vegetation surveys underrepresent ecologically and culturally important forbs in a threatened grassland ecosystem
Bryan A. Endress, Joshua P. Averett, Shawn Steinmetz, Eric J. Quaempts (2022) · Conservation Science and Practice

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Camassia 2 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 63 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.