Lewis Blue Flax

Perennial Forb, Seed Code: LILE

• Seeds per lb: 295000
• Average Height: 18-30 Inches

Lewis Flax is common and widely distributed in the Intermountain West with a very wide habitat range from blackbrush, salt desert shrub, sagebrush, and pinyon-juniper communities up to mountain meadows. It has a beautiful electric blue flower and is prolific in petal production. It prefers full sun and rich to well-drained soils. It is very cold and drought hardy. Lewis flax plants are not long-lived, usually 3-5 years. It reseeds freely if there is not too much competition.

Flax seeds are readily collected by hand-stripping the capsules in midsummer. These are round and divided into sections like an orange, with a flattened, almond-shaped black seed in each section. The seeds are very sticky when wet, which helps fasten them to surface of the ground and aids in root penetration.

Blue Flax is used extensively in reclamation. We have 2006 crop in stock with a current analysis report.