General Informations
Iris pseudacorus (yellow flag, yellow iris, water flag) is a species of flowering plant of the family Iridaceae. It is native to Europe, western Asia and northwest Africa. Its specific epithet, meaning “false acorus”, refers to the similarity of its leaves to those of Acorus calamus (sweet flag) as they have a prominently veined mid-rib and sword-like shape. However, they are not closely related.
The plant was rated in second place for per day nectar production per flower in a UK plants survey conducted by the AgriLand project which is supported by the UK Insect Pollinators Initiative. (However, when number of flowers per floral unit, flower abundance, and phenology were taken into account it dropped out of the top 10 for most nectar per unit cover per year, as did all plants that placed in the top ten along with this one for per day nectar production per flower, with the exception of common comfrey, Symphytum officinale
