Plantae > Tracheophyta > Liliopsida > Asparagales > Iridaceae > Iris > Iris versicolor

Iris versicolor (Harlequin Blueflag)

Synonyms:

Wikipedia Abstract

Iris versicolor is also commonly known as the blue flag, harlequin blueflag, larger blue flag, northern blue flag, and poison flag, plus other variations of these names, and in Britain and Ireland as purple iris. It is a species of Iris native to North America, in the Eastern United States and Eastern Canada. It is common in sedge meadows, marshes, and along streambanks and shores. The specific epithet versicolor means "variously coloured".
View Wikipedia Record: Iris versicolor

Attributes

Allergen Potential [1]  Medium-Low
Flower Type [2]  Hermaphrodite
Hazards [2]  Many plants in this genus are thought to be poisonous if ingested, so caution is advised; The roots are especially likely to be toxic; Plants can cause skin irritations and allergies in some people;
Lifespan [2]  Perennial
Pollinators [2]  Insects, Lepidoptera
Structure [3]  Herb
Usage [2]  A fine blue infusion is obtained from the flowers and this can be used as a litmus substitute to test for acids and alkalis; The leaves have been used to weave baskets and mats; Some native North American Indian tribes used the root as a protection against rattlesnakes. It was believed that, so long as the root was handled occasionally to ensure the scent permeated the person and their clothes, rattlesnakes would not bite them. Some tribes even used to chew the root and then hold rattlesnakes with their teeth and were not bitten so long as the scent persisted;
Height [2]  24 inches (0.6 m)
Width [2]  39 inches (1 m)
View Plants For A Future Record : Iris versicolor

Ecoregions

Name Countries Ecozone Biome Species Report Climate Land
Use
Central & Western Europe Austria, Belgium, Byelarus, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Ukraine, United Kingdom Palearctic Temperate Floodplain River and Wetlands    
Laurentian Great Lakes Canada, United States Nearctic Large Lakes    
Northeast US & Southeast Canada Atlantic Drainages Canada, United States Nearctic Temperate Coastal Rivers    
Northern Baltic Drainages Denmark, Finland, Norway, Russia, Sweden Palearctic Polar Freshwaters    
St. Lawrence Canada, United States Nearctic Temperate Coastal Rivers    

Protected Areas

Emblem of

Quebec

Providers

External References

USDA Plant Profile

NatureServe Explorer

Citations

Attributes / relations provided by
♦ 1Derived from Allergy-Free Gardening OPALS™, Thomas Leo Ogren (2000)
♦ 2Plants For A Future licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
♦ 3Kattge, J. et al. (2011b) TRY - a global database of plant traits Global Change Biology 17:2905-2935
♦ 4Robertson, C. Flowers and insects lists of visitors of four hundred and fifty three flowers. 1929. The Science Press Printing Company Lancaster, PA.
Ecoregions provided by World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). WildFinder: Online database of species distributions, ver. 01.06 Wildfinder Database
Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0