Fernald's iris - Central California Coastal Range

Iris fernaldii forms part of the rich flora of Jack London State Park in Sonoma County, about 12 miles south of the "type locality" (where the specimens used to describe the species were first collected). Plants grow individually in the filtered light of a protective oak canapy, and extend slightly outward into the grasslands along the forest edge.

In these sunny, more exposed areas they sometimes encounter and interbreed with Iris macrosiphon. March 26, 2003. Steve Ayala.

Rockville County Park in Solano county hosts a thriving population of Fernald's iris. The deciduous oak forest marks the western border of California's
great central valley. April 8, 2001. Steve Ayala.

Iris fernaldii, growing out of the surrounding oak forest to recolonize an abandoned apple orchard on a hillside above Blue Lake, in Mendocino county, California.
April 23, 2000. Steve Ayala

Fernald's iris, blooming profusely in the dappled shaded of scattered trees and bushes on Bartlett Mountain in Lake county, California. Six years earlier,
the huge 1996 Bartlett Springs forest fire removed several square miles of dense underbrush and thinned the surrounding oak-pine forest.
June 8, 2002. Steve Ayala