Blackberry Lilies

Years ago I learned about the Blackberry Lily when I was active in the Herb Guild of McLean County.  On occasion I would think about digging up just one of the Blackberry Lilies in the large Trail Garden the Guild worked - who would ever know.  Of course I never followed through.  

As part of a Master Gardener project, last summer while helping the children at Metcalf Lab School who belonged to an after-school gardening club, I noticed a huge bank of Blackberry Lilies.  The sponsor of the group saved me seeds and now I have them in our prairie garden as well as the patio garden.  The small blooms last only a day but there have been continuous blooms all month with more are to come.  Someone saw the leaves in our prairie garden earlier in the season and insisted they were iris because of the similarity in texture and shape.  Read on and you will learn the plant genus is iris!  

  Iris domestica (blackberry lily, leopard flower, leopard lily is an ornamental plant in the Iridaceae family. In 2005, based on molecular DNA sequence evidence, Belamcanda chinensis, the sole species in the genus Belamcanda, was transferred to the genus Iris and renamed Iris domestica.