FIELD ID CHARACTERISTICS:
Difficult to identify without flowers, but blue flowers on long stalks and brown capsules are distinctive.
Synonym(s): Sisyrinchium bermudiana, Sisyrinchium graminoides
Description: Low, spreading perennial with strongly flat-widened, branching flowering stems and blue flowers; about 25 to 30 cm high.
Leaves: Linear blades, smooth margins, 2.5 to 5 mm wide; flowering stems branched past the middle and flowering with one or a few flowers at the tips.
Flowers/Fruit: Blue, 6-petaled flowers, 2 cm wide, on long stalks at stem ends, which are flattened. Blooms March to June; fruits June to August. Brown rounded capsules 4 to 6 mm long.
Habit and Range: Found in a wide array of habitats including moist woodlands, meadows, floodplain forest margins, savannahs. Frequent to common throughout the state.
COMMON CONFUSIONS:
Sisyrinchium angustifolium (narrowleaf blue-eyed grass) is similar to Sisyrinchium atlanticum (eastern blue-eyed grass), which lives in drier places and has narrower and lighter green leaves, and black fruit capsules at maturity. Flower stalks in Sisyrinchium angustifolium are much shorter in most other Sisyrinchium species.
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