Blue Flag, Larger Blue Flag, Harlequin Blue flag, Native Minnesota Wildflower plant, Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden

	Plants of the Eloise Butler Wildflower Garden
	Common Name	Scientific Name	Plant Family	Garden Location	Prime Season
	Blue Flag Iris	Iris versicolor L.	Iris	Woodland	Early Summer
Other names and notes	(Larger Blue Flag, Harlequin Blue flag). A plant of marshes and wet meadows, 1 to 3 feet high with 3 -petal flowers about 4 inches wide that are blue with yellow veins. Very showy. Leaves are sword-like typical of Iris. The root stock is a corm. Propagation is by seed or single corms cut from the main root stock. While the plant has few pests or diseases, it can be overgrown by more aggressive plants. Bloom time is the last half of June in this part of Minnesota. The genus name, Iris, is after the Greek goddess of the rainbow.

Notes: This plant is indigenous to the Garden area. Eloise Butler catalogued it on May 25, 1907. Native to most of Minnesota except counties in the SE and most of the Western counties. In the SE quadrant of the state there is another species, Iris virginica, that replaces the Iris versicolor. On a map of North America the plants' range would be the NE quadrant, not south of West Virginia and north to Hudson Bay. It is a beautiful flower of the moist woodland. The plant needs moist soil and in the Garden it occurs along the bog trail (Lady Slipper Lane).

Eloise Butler has this to say about the Iris: “If eyes were made for seeing, we do not need to be poets in order to note the grace of the recurved petals, the stately pose of the flower and the choice reserve that withholds, except under close inspection, the delicate finish of etched lines and blending of color. The flower is richer than other lilies by reason of the pistil terminating above in three leafy divisions colored like the petals. Behind them are artfully concealed the three long stamens in exactly the right position for the insect guest to be powdered with the pollen." Published in the Minneapolis Sunday Tribune July 2, 1911

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References: Plant characteristics are generally from sources 15, 16, 30, 31, 33, W2 & W3. Distribution principally from W2 and also 31, 34 and W1. Planting history generally from 1, 4 & 4a. Other sources by specific reference. See Reference List for details.

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