Sleeping Tree Camp

Giant camp in Whiterun Hold built around the strange Sleeping Tree, whose sap boosts health, distorts your vision and sells well to Ysolda.

Sleeping Tree Camp is a giant encampment southwest of Fort Greymoor, south-southeast of Swindler’s Den, east of Broken Fang Cave and north of the Lady Stone. Its claim to fame is the Sleeping Tree, the only one of its kind anyone knows of, growing out of a little pond that gives off a purple mist. Two giants and two mammoths guard it, so harvesting here takes either diplomacy or a lot of arrows.

What you’ll find

  • The Sleeping Tree in its purplish-blue pond, with a sap spigot sticking out of the trunk.
  • Two giants and two mammoths in the immediate area.
  • A large campfire with skeevers skewered on poles above it – two charred skeever hides to collect.
  • Nirnroot around the pond’s edge, along with lavender and mora tapinella.
  • Butterflies by day, torchbugs and luna moths by night.
  • Sleeping Tree Cave, entered on the west side of the path heading north from the camp, with a chest that can hold random ingredients.

Harvesting the sap

Use the spigot to get a bottle of Sleeping Tree Sap. Drinking it gives you 100 extra health for 45 seconds, but your vision turns purple and wobbly and you move more slowly – a bit like the morning after the Bannered Mare. The sap refills every three in-game days if the spigot is left alone. A side job lets you sell the sap to Ysolda once you’ve found the items that trigger it.

Quests

  • Kill the Giant – a Jarl may send you here to deal with a troublesome giant.
  • Ysolda’s Shipment – the sap deal mentioned above.

Tips

Don’t knock the spigot out of the tree during a fight. If it falls off, you can’t collect sap again until the area resets about a month later. Giants hit hard enough to launch you into orbit, so use ranged attacks from high ground, or just sneak in, grab the sap and the nirnroot, and leave them in peace.

Good to know

Nobody really knows where the tree came from. Ysolda has heard two stories: that a piece of Red Mountain landed here during its eruption and the tree grew from the crater, or that it sprouted from a spore that fell from Umbriel, a floating island in the sky – which would make it a type of Hist tree, different from those in Black Marsh. The unmarked Puzzling Pillar Ruins lie to the southeast and Necromancer’s Bluff to the east.

Nearby

Closest places covered on TamrielSaga: Broken Fang Cave, Swindler’s Den, Gjukar’s Monument, Fort Greymoor, Whiterun Imperial Camp.

Location data (hold, map position, editor ID) read from the Skyrim game files; details checked against community wiki articles and summarised in our own words.

Characters found here

Quests that lead here

Creatures you will meet

Giants in Skyrim are peaceful herders – until you get too close. Where giant camps are, why they launch you into orbit and how to beat them.
Mammoths roam Skyrim’s tundra under the watch of giants. Where to find them, how dangerous they are and why hunters want their tusks.
Skeevers are Skyrim’s giant rats – weak, everywhere and occasionally diseased. Where to find them and what the skeever tail is good for.

Weapons found here

Armor found here

Items found here

Sleeping Tree Sap in Skyrim raises Health by 100 points for 45 seconds but slows and drugs the drinker. Where to find it, its effects and the Ysolda quest link.

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Sources checked: Skyrim game files (map markers, location records, read 2026-10-11); Elder Scrolls Fandom location articles (export 2026-10-11)