Bluebell

Common Name:               Bluebell

Scientific Name:               Hyacinthoides non-scripta

Irish Name:         Coinnle corra

Family Group:    Liliaceae

One of the most beautiful sights of our woodlands is to be seen from April each year when our beloved Bluebells spread a hazy, blue carpet under the trees and over grassy banks. These bulbous perennials have fleshy, glossy, linear leaves which are keeled and come from the root.  At the tip of the leaves is a little hood. The long racemes or spikes of four-to-fifteen, drooping, tubular, purplish-blue flowers are one-sided, the leafless stems curving over gracefully.  Each flower (14-20mm long) has cream anthers and six backward curving lobes. The latter point makes it easily distinguished from its competitor, the Spanish Bluebell or Hyacinthoides hispanica which has non-curving lobes and which also differs in that its flowers are not in a one-sided spike. The anthers in the Spanish Bluebell are blue. Bluebells bloom from April to May. The fruits are egg-shaped capsules with black seeds.  This is a native plant belonging to the family Lilaceae

This information is courtesy of http://www.wildflowersofireland.net/