VERNAL IRIS 



Iris verna Linnaeus 



Although the vernal iris is not very well known, it is so lovely a 

 wildHng that it should find a home in our wildflower gardens. In his 

 "Book of the Iris", Dykes reports his inability to cultivate it, but this 

 was probably owing to his failure to recognize its peculiar soil require- 

 ments. It usually grows on wooded hillsides, preferring a mediacid soil. 

 Though the whole plant is only about six inches tall, its violet-blue 

 flowers with yellow markings at the base of the petals cannot be easily 

 overlooked, for they are very large in proportion to the grasslike leaves. 

 In early spring the blossoms dot the barren fields of the Southern States, 

 where real blue violets do not occur, and are often called "violets." 

 Curiously enough, their delicate fragrance adds to the deception, for it 

 closely resembles the scent of the garden violet 



This iris ranges over most of Alabama and Georgia and the states 

 adjoining them on the north, but farther northward it becomes rare, 

 occurring in but a few favored localities in Kentucky, Maryland, and 

 Pennsylvania. 



The specimen painted was found near Beaufort, South Carolina. 



PLATE 13 



