Kingdom: Plantae

Phylum: Magnoliophyta -- flowering plants

Class: Magnoliopsida -- dicots

Family: Linaceae -- flax

Common Name: Lewis flax, prairie flax

Species Code: LILE3

Origin: Native to dry, open places from sagebrush steppe to open pine forests over much of central and western North America. The Palouse phase is var. lewisii.

Rare: no

Form: forb, perennial from a woody crown, glabrous and glaucous overall; stems branched at base, simple above, erect, 10-60 cm tall.

Duration: perennial

Habitat Type: prairie

Wetland Indicator Status: not listed

Leaves: alternate, linear to lanceolate, 1-3 cm long, acute to rounded.

Flowers: borne in a raceme on short pedicles; sepals 5, ovate, 4-7 mm long, margins membranous, entire; petals 5, blue or rarely white, 10-23 mm long, obovate, fugacious.

Bloom: May, June

Fruit: capsule, globose to subglobose, 4-8 mm in diameter, 10 celled; seeds 3.5-4.5 mm long, ovate, compressed, shiny, brown.

Characteristics:
L. perenne var. lewisii in Hitchcock & Cronquist 1973, L. lewisii in St. John 1963, Piper & Beattie 1914, Davis 1953.
The cultivar "Appar" was originally collected and released as the native L. lewisii, but has since been shown to be the European L. perenne.
The European L. perenne is very similar except the flowers have dimorphic styles while L. lewisii does not.
Flowers are perfect.
Reproduces sexually by seed.
294,848 seeds/lb (USDA NRCS Plants Database 2007).
Fruit is a capsule.
Taprooted with a woody crown.
n=9.
Pollinated by a wide variety of bees and flies (Kearns & Inouye 1994).
Flowers are self-compatible but insects are required for pollen movement (Kearns & Inouye 1994).
Fibers from the plant were used to make string. The plant was also used medicinally.
May be poisonous to livestock when ingested.

Comments: other references:
Addicott 1977.
plant guide from the USDA NRCS PLANTS Database

Precipitation: 10-24 inches (USDA NRCS PLANTS Database 2007).

Hazards: May be poisonous to livestock.

Stratification: cold moist

Seed yield: high

Seed harvest: late July

Seed first harvest: first season

Seed cleaning: easy

Planting duration: medium

Seed insect problem: no

Seed shatter: low

Seed size: medium-large

Seed harvest date: late July

Seed comments: beware of European imports

Alternate Genus: Linum

Alternate Species: perenne

Alternate Variety: lewisii

Remarks:
Propagation:
Seeds germinate at 20-30^oC (Chirco & Turnoer 1986).
Light required for germination (Young & Young 1986).
No dormancy was found in the cultivar Appar (L. perenne) or in Palouse accessions of L. lewisii, but some ecotypes from cold winter sites require prechilling. Garden grown seed is less dormant than wild collected seed (Meyer & Kitchen 1994).
Preliminary data suggests that at least some Palouse ecotypes have seed dormancy and require cold moist stratification to germinate (unpublished data, Pullman Plant Materials Center).
In Colorado, the best stands result from fall seeding (Fisher et al 1987).
Seed stores up to 10 years in an unheated warehouse (Stevens et al 1981).

Notes: Linum lewisii is easy to grow from seed. Needs to grow where it is not overtopped by other vegetation. Beautiful blue to purple flowers. Likes open areas in full sun. Sow in spring. Petals fall off upon picking, so it isn’t good for cut flowers. Flowers open in the morning, drop their petals in the afternoon, then new flowers open the next day and repeat the cycle. Watch out for the non-native cultivar Appar, which is a European flax. Don’t grow Appar near stands of native flax. Other names include western blue flax, wild blue flax, prairie flax, Lewis flax, Linum perenne var. lewisii (Skinner et al 2005).