Wild Blue Flax

Linum lewisii

Hosts 1 caterpillarPollinator plant

Growing it

When	Flowers June to August
Type	wildflower
Sun	Full sun
Water	Low
Soil	pH 6–8
Hardiness	zone 3–8
Mature height	0.5 m
Mature spread	0.3 m
Spacing	0.2 m
Years to maturity	1
Bloom	Jun–Aug
Flower colour	Blue read from a published flora
In bloom	June July August
Native to	AB, SK

narrow linear leaves about 2.5 cm long

Where it has been recorded

BothSpecimensObservations

230 squares of about 28 km, each holding at least one record. A square is not a claim that the plant grows throughout it, and an unshaded square is unrecorded rather than empty. Darker squares hold more records, which follows roads and towns as much as it follows the plant. 75 herbarium specimens and 866 field observations this project may redraw. A filled dot is a pressed sheet somebody can re-examine; a hollow ring is a photograph identified by community agreement. Where the dots are dense is where people have looked, not where the plant is commonest, and empty ground is unsurveyed rather than unoccupied. How this map is made.

Which ecoregions the records fall in

Fescue Grassland south AB: 476 records, high confidence
Aspen Parkland central AB / SK: 452 records, high confidence
Moist Mixed Grassland south AB / SK: 371 records, high confidence
Mixed Grassland south AB / SK: 271 records, high confidence
Northern Continental Divide south AB: 175 records, high confidence
Eastern Continental Ranges central AB: 145 records, high confidence
Cypress Upland south AB / SK: 36 records, high confidence
Peace Lowland north AB: 33 records, high confidence
Boreal Transition central AB / SK: 15 records, medium confidence
Western Alberta Upland central AB: 13 records, medium confidence

These are counts of records collected somewhere in the region, which is the resolution of the evidence: the map above shows where inside it. A region with 3 records is not the same claim as one with three hundred, so the count travels with the region. A region missing from this list means nobody has recorded it there, which is not the same as the plant being absent. Records within 900 m of a border count for neither side, because the border is not drawn finely enough to say which one they are on. Source: GBIF occurrence search + PRESERVED_SPECIMEN pass, retrieved 2026-08-24. Boundaries digitised from the National Ecological Framework for Canada v2.2 (Ecological Stratification Working Group 1995), simplified to about 900 m for display: an outline is accurate to roughly a kilometre, not to the metre. How these counts are made.

See every observation, live and current, on GBIF or iNaturalist.

Documented animals

51 documented relationships.

nectar for

Agapostemon texanus Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Andrena miranda LaManna et al. 2020
Andrena nigrocaerulea Specimen records from the USDA-ARS:BBSL1165701 collection
Bicoloured Sweat Bee Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Brown-belted Bumble Bee Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Brown-tailed Bumble Bee Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Calligrapher Fly Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Central Bumble Bee Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Cryptic Bumble Bee Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Erynnis propertius Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Eucera edwardsii Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Eupeodes perplexus LaManna et al. 2020
Eupeodes volucris Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Gesneria centuriella Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Golden Northern Bumble Bee Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Halictus confusus Clint Otto et al. 2020
Helophilus hybridus Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Hoplitis producta Specimen records from the USDA-ARS:BBSL1177101 collection
Hunt's Bumble Bee Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Hylaeus modestus Specimen records from the USDA-ARS:BBSL1165700 collection
Lasioglossum kincaidii Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Lasioglossum marinense LaManna et al. 2020
Megachile melanophaea Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Megachile montivaga Specimen records from ecdysis.org
Ornate Checkered Beetle Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Red-belted Bumble Bee Specimen records from www.bumblebeewatch.org
Scaeva affinis Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Silvery Blue Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Sphaerophoria sulphuripes Specimen records from iNaturalist.org
Yellow-fronted Bumble Bee Specimen records from www.bumblebeewatch.org

pollen for

Agapostemon texanus Guzman et al. 2022
Andrena nigrocaerulea Guzman et al. 2022
Bicoloured Sweat Bee Guzman et al. 2022
Brown-tailed Bumble Bee Guzman et al. 2022
Calligrapher Fly Guzman et al. 2022
Erynnis propertius Guzman et al. 2022
Eucera edwardsii Guzman et al. 2022
Eupeodes volucris Guzman et al. 2022
Halictus tripartitus Guzman et al. 2022
Large Bee Fly Guzman et al. 2022
Lasioglossum incompletum Guzman et al. 2022
Lasioglossum knereri Guzman et al. 2022
Lasioglossum nevadense Guzman et al. 2022
Megachile rotundata Guzman et al. 2022
Melissodes microstictus Guzman et al. 2022
Orange-legged Furrow Bee Guzman et al. 2022
Osmia pusilla Guzman et al. 2022
Platycheirus stegnus Guzman et al. 2022
Small Sweat Bees Packer
Toxomerus occidentalis Guzman et al. 2022

caterpillar host for

White-lined Sphinx Pohl et al. 2018

Also worth knowing

Safety

Toxicity not assessed, absence of a warning is not a guarantee of safety

Buying it

About $8–$16 per plant (estimate), usually stocked by garden centres. Estimate (herb default); AB retail as of 2026

Where these numbers came from

Flower detail: not verified, a genus-level estimate