Twenty-six species, North America, Central America, South America, Asia.

The tuber-forming species of Claytonia have a long history of use for food by both Native Americans and European colonists. The small tubers sometimes have been called by fanciful names, such as fairy spuds or fairy potatoes and have a somewhat nutty flavor. Elsewhere, some of the annual species, such as C. perfoliata (see below), have been harvested for salads.

For a number of years, a small population of C. perfoliata Donn ex Willd. ssp. perfoliata persisted as weeds in a gravel waste area between two greenhouses at the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis. The origins of this small population are unclear, but perhaps seeds were accidentally introduced as soil contaminants in plants that were cultivated in a greenhouse. This unusual occurrence was discovered by John MacDougal (then manager of conservatories at the institution) and is vouchered by his specimen from 2000 in the Garden’s herbarium. However, the plants did not spread to other areas and apparently have since become extirpated from the site. Thus, this species is not fully treated in the present account. Claytonia perfoliata (miner’s lettuce) is a many-stemmed spring annual with a wide native range from western Canada and the western United States discontinuously through Mexico to Central America and South America. It differs from the other Missouri species in its smaller flowers with usually white petals 2–6 mm long, as well as in its characteristic pair of stem leaves that are circular to somewhat quadrangular in outline, disc- to somewhat cup-shaped, and completely perfoliate around the stems.