Flower:

A single round cluster about 1 inch in diameter at the tip of a naked stem, with 6 to 20 stalked, ¼-inch white flowers. Flowers have 6 tepals (petals with similar sepals), 6 stamens with white to pale yellow tips, and a green ovary in the center with 3 globular sections. Flowers appear 4 to 6 weeks after leaves have emerged, the leaves usually withered away before flowers open.

Leaves and stems:

2 or 3 three basal leaves emerge from an underground bulb in early spring, 6 to 8+ inches (15 to 22 cm) long, the broadest to ~1½ inches (2 to 4 cm) wide, lance-elliptic, mostly pointed at the tip, tapering the base, toothless, hairless, green all the way to the base, stalkless to short-stalked. The flowering stalk is 5 to 7+ inches (13 to 18 cm) long, smooth, usually purple, and starts emerging as the leaves wither away for the season.

Fruit:

Fruit is a 3-celled capsule, each cell containing a single glossy black seed,

Notes:

A denizen of shady woods, Wild Leeks, a.k.a. Ramps, can form thick colonies of lush green leaves in early spring but flowers are small and can go unnoticed when in the presence of later summer species. Leaves and flowers both have a strong onion odor, especially when bruised. There were formerly 2 varieties which have been split into separate species, though Minnesota has not officially accepted this split (yet): A. tricoccum (Wild Leek, formerly var. tricoccum) and A. burdickii (Narrow-leaf Wild Leek, formerly var. burdickii). Both species are found in Minnesota in the same kind of habitat and their native ranges overlap; A. tricoccum is the more common of the two.

Comparing the two, A. burdickii has narrower leaves green at the base, 20 or fewer flowers per cluster, blooms through June into the first week of July, and the underground bulb is up to ~1½ inches (2 to 4 cm) long and up to ~½ inch (1 to 1.5 cm) wide. A. tricoccum has broader leaves red to purple at the base, 12 to 50 flowers in a cluster, blooms in late June through July, and the underground bulb is larger, 4 to 6 cm long and 1.5 to 3 cm wide. I have both species in my own garden and the earlier bloom of A. burdickii certainly held true—it was pretty much done the first week of July where A. tricoccum flowers did not open until mid July. Compared to other woodland species with similarly shaped basal leaves, Wild Leeks are most easily distinguished by the onion scent.

Note that there are dozens of herbarium records that are not identified to var so A. burdickii may well be more common in Minnesota than the current distribution map indicates, but most of those records are likely A. tricoccum (var. tricoccum).