Wild Blue Flag Iris are blooming now in our damper areas, sometimes pleasantly sprinkled with the yellow of Buttercups, as you see here:
This small iris, Iris versicolor (“variously-colored iris”), is a native to the Northeastern United States and Eastern Canada. It’s also known as Harlequin Blueflag, Larger Blue Flag, and Northern Blue Flag. It’s especially attractive in the rain:
Blue Flag Iris has a nemesis: Yellow Flag Iris, an invasive species native to Europe, Western Asia and Northwest Africa that has escaped gardens and has naturalized itself in the wilds that Blue Flag likes. Here’s one:
This yellow-flowered plant is scientifically named Iris pseudoacorus. The epithet pseudoacorus means "false acorus," which refers to the similarity of the yellow iris’s leaves to those of Acorus calamus, which is commonly called Sweet Flag, but is not an iris. (Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on June 16 and 18 [2nd Blue Iris], 2023.)