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Show Sunday. October Jl TfDQjLQlv XJ'Si,si'j Timely issues, news, features, including family, food, fashion I V : V - Vjr.AK. .v .. . v y, Vf. j r'l 'J fT " - VT. - i x-- 3- l$ V V - Page v v 1 x THE HERALD, Provo, Utah, 31, 1982 ' --A iAV; Meb Anderson Photos IV hen the Sego Lily Made the Desert Bloom BY RENEE C. NELSON Herald Women's Editor The sego lily symbolizes beauty, usefulness, independence and courage in the wilderness, as well as hardiness and endurance. When early pioneers were starving, it was the sego lily they pulled from the ground for nourishment. The bulb is somewhat akin to potatoes in flavor and can be eaten either raw or cooked. Because it was used as food to survive, it earned its place as the Utah State flower. The bulb is actually a thick underground stem, .(that is sometimes mistaken for the poisoness camas bulb). Animals too find nourishment in the plant. Bears and rodents forage for the bulbs and sheep eat the seed pods. The plant is one of the mariposa lilies mariposa meaning butterfly in Spanish. This seems appropriate, since the three petals do resemble butterfly wings. They are white, tinted with yellowish-greeor lilac with a spot of purple at the n base. It is one of 40 of the flowering mariposa herbs native to western North America. Utah adopted it, though the plant was a native of Washington and New Mexico. The plant is protected in Utah, so it is illegal to pick the blossoms or dig up the plants. Some gardeners may want to try growing the plant as a challenge, because it is difficult to reproduce the growing conditions in which the Sego Lily flourishes. i-fi-t There are two ways to obtain the seeds. One is to mark the plants while they are blooming, then return later to collect the seeds. The other is to purchase seeds from one of several companies dealing in the seeds of native plants. The sego lily is dormant this time of year. In fact it is an g endangered flowering herb, since it grows along the low, and which for so residential are slopes popular commercial development. But its legend remains, including the Indian legend that the sego lily was provided by the Great Spirit as an answer to prayers in regard to starvation. west-facin- ii VV t ri 0 7 S3 |
