Monday, May 29, 2023

Bristly Iris, Canada Mayflower

I'm always on the lookout for new plants and this spring I found a Bristly Iris (iris setosa).  It is similar to a Siberian iris, but is shorter and the flower is a paler, more delicate purple. I'm very pleased with it so far.  It is planted where it gets morning and early afternoon sun and will get runoff from the roof.  Unlike a bearded iris, it likes a moist location.


This little woodland plant is a Canada mayflower or some call it wild lily-of-the-valley.  It is a common flower but is never very abundant.  I had forgotten its name and spent time on the internet trying to find a picture of it, but no luck.  I remembered that I have a small book that I got years ago that has watercolour illustrations of flowers of eastern Canada. A bit of digging on the bookshelf and I found the book. The pages were falling out as the glue had dried out but sure enough there was a picture of the Canada mayflower with its popular names and also its botanical name.  Once I had its botanical name (maianthemum canadense) I found several pictures on the internet.  I'm not sure why my original searches for  "little woodland flower with white flowers in Ontario" didn't give me any results.

After some cool weather, the warmth has arrived.  The vegetables are starting to grow  and the perennials are shooting up.

Happy gardening.
 

2 comments:

  1. My eye was immediately attracted to the delicate colour of the iris, I've always thought the more normal shades are a little overpowering. Have you tried using a visual search? Just type in "image search" and you should find some sort of facility where you can simply drag and drop, or upload, a photo. It then finds the nearest image it can. Doesn't always work but I just tried it with your picture and it worked a treat.

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  2. Thanks for the tip! Jenny

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