Linum Species, Blue Flax, Perennial Flax

I first moved to Vernal, Utah 5 years ago and found to my delight that I had small blue flowers that bloomed all summer. I did my researc...Read Moreh and found them to be Blue Flax. I have collected the seeds and have many more plants to enjoy. Vernal is 5,540 feet in elevation and has very little rain during the Summer and Winters can be quite harsh but these lovely flowers return every Spring.

We have wild blue flax all over our property. Not sure where it came from, but we did not plant it. We live at 6000 ft. above sea level...Read More in a semi-arid valley, with about 11 inches of rain a year. Temperatures range from -30 F to +90 F.

This is an extraordinary plant anyway you look at it! The flower petals are an exquisite pale blue. The center of the flower has a little yellow-orange dot. The entire flower assembly rotates hour by hour to face the sun, then all the flowers fall off at sunset. Yes, true! The ground is covered with pale blue confetti. And the next morning, the whole process starts again. It is totally amazing to watch hundreds of these flowers bloom, rotate in unison, and then fall to the ground.

These are hardy, nearly indestructible plants that need no maintenance. They will propagate themselves slowly over time. They are great in dry climates and really add something to an open field or other large area that has been abandoned to nature.

I have this plant blooming with the orange siberian wallflower--beautiful! I sowed the seeds last year; it is blooming this year. For an ...Read Moreearly spring showcase, this has been stunning.

I planted blue flax last spring from seed, and luckily interplanted it with other things! It was slow to come up and absolutely ephemeral...Read More once above ground, mere wisps of stems with almost needle like (scale not texture) foliage. I'm looking forward to a perhaps more established show this year. A small field of these blue flowers sounds like a dream to me.

We put this in a sunny, rather dry spot. It didn't do much last year when we planted it, but it is already flowering this year. Not som...Read Moreething to plant for big foliage, but the flowers are pretty. May need protection against rabbits (we had trouble with this once). Has not self-seeded for us yet, but a friend in our neighborhood reports that it does.

This plant has the most lovely ferny foliage that looked great all season, into fall. It did not flower profusely for me, but the flowers...Read More were lovely paired with the foliage.

when i was 12, my mother bought a bag of raw flax seed to eat. i "stole" some of the seeds, potted them in a cup, and placed a cd on top ...Read Moreof them and quickly forgot about it. 3 days later they had germenated, and had actually shoved the cd off of them. weeks later, they had healthy new growth, and were about 3 inches tall. my mom was very surprized:) i planted them outside, where they grew about a foot tall, until a racoon ( which had rabies) dug them up, and killed them :( ... the racoon was shot by a neighbor. we coouldent take any chances, living in the sub urbs, with many small children around.. the flowers were beautiful though

A beautiful flower which comes in the spring year after year. The stems are too weak to resist the wind and rain, so some lower plants sh...Read Moreould be planted around to sustain them. Next season I will plant some alpine dianthus all around.
When in flower they have an oceanlike look. The afternoon sun wilts the flowers but new ones will grow next day. A real favourite very easy to grow.

quite a invasive plant, and overseeds onto the lawn very easily. the flowers are nice but kind of on the small side and the foilage kinda...Read More resembles a weed.

This blue flax has become one of my favorites. It started blooming in early Spring and I love the way the sky-blue flowers shimmer in th...Read Moree breeze. Doesn't seem to be a fussy plant at all.

One of the loveliest things about this plant is that the blooms, which last a day, shed and leave "blue snow" scattered beneath them. Al...Read Moretho they are perennial, I have lost them in especially cold winters, but they seem to reseed sporadically in my Cape Cod garden. I feel that this is an underrated plant, here, at least, as I haven't seen anyone else growing them locally. A lovely, informal blue flower worth trying.

This plant has been growing in my gardens for years, and it tends to be a bit on the invasive side. However, the excess plants are easil...Read Morey pulled up. It reseeds readily.

This plant did extremely well for me until this year, when the cats decided that it was one of their favorite napping spots (as in right ...Read Morein the center of the plant). Not bad for a 10-year-old plant, really--I'll try cutting it back to regenerate it.

We live in a rather dry zone 3 city (Edmonton, Canada) and blue flax grows very well here. It is a delicate, very well behaved plant - no...Read Moret spreading all over the place, but popping up reliably every spring. We have it planted in a west-facing garden which gets quite a bit of sun in the spring, but is shady once the trees around it leaf out in the summer. The flax provides background foilage for early bulbs, like daffodils, then blooms & adds some colour with the rest of the summer flowers.

Blue flax has lacy, blue-green foliage and sky blue flowers in early summer. It's a drought-tolerant perennial, looking especially nice ...Read Morewith ornamental grasses and other wildflowers.

Flax seed and oil is a healthy addition to the diet, and the plant fiber is the raw material in linen cloth.

Flax is a com...Read Moremon livestock food as well, although green flax straw may cause nitrate poisoning in cattle and sheep.

Very pretty perennial plant with gorgeous sky blue flowers :)

Beautiful flowers, good addition to any perennial garden. Blooms first in the late spring and off and on throughout the summer.
<...Read Morebr /> Has become one of my favorites

Days to germination: 20-25. All-blue, satiny flowers. Cut back after flowering to promote more blooms.