Scape 2-10 cm, slender. Flowers 14-24 mm; perianth pale bluish to lilac, rotate, tube urceolate, strongly constricted above ovary, 6-10 mm, tough, opaque, not splitting in fruit, lobes widely spreading, 11-17 mm, inner 5-7 mm wide; filaments 0.5-4 mm, base not triangular, with narrow abaxial wings, appendages absent; anthers linear, 1-5 mm, apex hooked; staminodia erect, held close to stamens, white, broad, 5-8 mm, margins 1/2 involute at mid-length, apex notched; ovary 3-4 mm; style 5-6 mm; pedicel 1-3 cm. 2n = 12.

Flowering spring (Apr--early May). Grasslands, gravelly clay soils; 0--500 m; Calif.

Brodiaea minor grows along the low foothills of the Sierra Nevada range. It is very similar to B. purdyi, which may be only a subspecies of it.