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Linum lewisii |
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| Common name |
blue flax |
| Family |
linaceae |
| Life cycle |
perennial |
| Flowers |
light blue |
| Size |
3 ft |
| Light |
full sun |
| Cultural notes |
not fussy |
From seed  |
Germinate at room temperature. Self-seeds in our garden.
Flowers first year from seed sown indoors early.
detailed seed-starting info below
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| Seed ripens | mid-July |
Pretty arching stems covered in blue flowers early summer, repeat blooms more lightly through summer. Not long-lived, so we allow volunteer seedlings to replace the older plants.
I've always been confused about the difference between L. lewisii and the very similar L. perenne. The former is native to North America, the latter to Eurasia. Recently I looked it up, and found (at various internet references): "the only significant difference appears to be that lewisii is homostylic [having styles all of the same length], and perenne heterostylic [see the Wikipedia article on heterostyly for more details]." In all, the difference from a gardener's perspective appears to be minor.
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| | Seed ripens in late July |
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We left this plant behind in our Pennsylvania garden (and wish it well); we don't grow it in Houston. Seed for this plant is included on my seed trade list One or more images of this plant are included in my stock photo catalog About my plant portraits
PlantLinks to other web pages about Linum lewisii
Some particularly helpful links to other websites
Visitors to this page have left the following comments| mike | May 03, 2005 | better descriptions please |
| Connie | Aug 29, 2010 | What lovely pics of one of my favorite plants. Love the little blue spider! |
| Gill | Jun 29, 2011 | Thanks for explaining the slight difference between L. lewisii and L. perenne. I had often wondered what the difference was. |
| Wendy | Sep 09, 2012 | The only difference I have found between L. lewisii and L.perenne is that lewisii has flower stems above the main plant and perenne has them within and near top but not above. |
- Seed from '13 trade. Baggy 70F (97%G, 5d)
- Seed from '13 trade. Baggy 70F (93%G, 7d)
- Seed from '15 garden. Baggy 70F (6%G, 7-17d); no seedling survival
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