Yellow and Orange 



Wild or Slender Yellow Flax 



{Linum yirginianum) Flax family 



Flowers — Yellow, about yi in. across, each from a leaf axil, scat- 

 tered along the slender branches. Sepals, 5 ; 5 petals, 5 

 stamens. Stem : i to 2 ft. high, branching, leafy. Leaves : 

 Alternate, seated on the stem; small, oblong, or lance- 

 shaped, I nerved. 



Preferred Habitat — Dry woodlands and borders ; shady places. 



F/o7iieri?ig Season — ^June — August. 



Distribution — New England to Georgia. 



Certainly in the Atlantic States this is the commonest of its 

 slender, dainty tribe ; but in bogs and swamps farther southward 

 and westward to Texas the Ridged Yellow Flax {L. striatum), 

 with leaves arranged opposite each other up to the branches and 

 an angled stem so sticky it "adheres to paper in which it is 

 dried," takes its place. 



" Blue were her eyes as the fairy flax," 



wrote Longfellow, as if blue flax were a familiar sight on this 

 side of the Atlantic. The charming little European plant [L. usi- 

 tatissimum), which has furnished the fibre for linen and the oily 

 seeds for poultices from time immemorial, is only a fugitive from 

 cultivation here. Unhappily, it is rarely met with along the 

 roadsides and railways as it struggles to gain a foothold in our 

 waste places. Possibly Longfellow had in mind the blue toad 

 flax (p. 51). 



Jewel-weed; Spotted Touch-me-not; Silver 

 Cap ; Wild Balsam ; Lady's Eardrops ; Snap 

 Weed ; Wild Lady's Slipper 



(Impatiens biflora) Jewel-weed family 



(/. fulva of Gray) 



Flowers — Orange yellow, spotted with reddish-brown, irregular, 

 I in. long or less, horizontal, 2 to 4 pendent by slender 

 footstalks on a long peduncle from leaf axils. Sepals, 3, 

 colored; i large, sac-shaped, contracted into a slender in- 

 curved spur and 2-toothed at apex ; 2 other sepals small. 

 Petals, 3 ; 2 of them 2-cleft into dissimilar lobes ; 5 short 

 stamens, i pistil. Stem .• 2 to ^ ft. high, smooth, branched, 

 colored, succulent. Leaves: Alternate, thin, pale beneath, 



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