Crown Brodiaea (Coronaria)

The Crown Brodiaea (Coronaria) is generally described as a perennial forb/herb. This is native to the U.S. (United States) .

Uses of : Landscaping, Medicinal, Culinary, etc.

Ethnobotanic: Corms were gathered with a wooden digging stick and eaten by the Wiyot, Atsugewi, Miwok, Yana and other tribes of California. The Miwok dug the bulbs about the first of May when the shoots were just appearing above the ground. They cooked the corms in an earth oven. The Atsugewi boiled the corms in water and sometimes cooked them in an earth oven.

General Characteristics


Required Growing Conditions

This plant was a greater California Central Valley plant at one time extending in vast numbers across the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys. Due to overgrazing, farming, and urban development this plant is becoming rare. It is also found in northwestern California, the central and northern Sierra Nevada, the Cascade Range and British Columbia at an elevational range from 0 to 1600 m. The plant is found in multiple plant community types including valley grassland, foothill woodland, mixed conifer forests, and volcanic mesas.

Cultivation and Care


If planting seeds of harvest brodiaea, store the seeds in a paper sack until autumn. Plant the seeds before October 1st in a container and care for them for two years before out-planting. Plant the seeds in six-inch pots because the corms will pull themselves down to the depth they require. Plant about 100 seeds per pot. Place them on top of the soil and sprinkle a little soil over them and put one-quarter inch gravel on top. Set the pots in partial shade so they won't dry out so fast. They can be outside or in a hot house. The seed does not need to be stratified. Start watering the pots right away and keep them slightly damp. Fertilize the pots in late winter and early spring and protect the plants from birds and other animals. If the pots are outside, let the rains naturally water the pots and in a drought year, supplement with hand watering. Stop watering as soon as the foliage of the plants turns yellow. Resume watering the next fall, if rains are insufficient. After the second year, separate the plants and transplant them two inches apart in the fall when the corms are dormant, and then water. Grow them for one or two more years or to bloom, repeating this cycle and then out-plant them in the autumn.

General Upkeep and Control


There are five major types of indigenous management activities conducted in California that were designed to ensure future corm production at traditional gathering sites: 1) conscious breaking off cormlets from the harvested parent corms and replanting them; 2) sparing whole plants; 3) harvesting the corms after plants have gone to seed and dumping the seeds in the hole; 4) burning areas; and 5) irrigation. Periodic digging and thinning of the corms and popping off the cormlets and replanting them may enhance grass nut numbers and densities. Digging corms may in fact be a form of tillage, which will increase the size of the gathering tract, aerate the soil, lower weed competition, and prepare the seedbed to increase seed germination rates. If harvest brodiaea populations require periodic disturbance to maintain and increase their populations, then indigenous harvesting regimes if reenacted, may help maintain populations. At the very least--populations that become overcrowded and show reduced vigor should be divided and separated.

Plant Basics
General Type Forb/herb
Growth Duration Perennial
Plant Nativity Native to U.S.

Source: USDA, NRCS, PLANTS Database,