S. I. Ali & Brian Mathew

Iris kemaonensis Credit: B. Mathew

Herbaceous perennials. Roots fibrous, thin or fleshy. Rizome or bulb or stolon; aerial stem solitary or many, simple or branched. Leaves mostly basal, flat, equitant, canaliculate, 4-angled or terete. Bracts (spathes or spathe valves) 2 or more, subtending 1 or more flowers. Flowers solitary or in few flowered cymes; sessile or shortly pedicallate. Perianth segments 6, connate at base with the hypanthium, forming a short to well-developed tube, dimorphic, outer 3 are known as falls, usually differentiated into basal glabrous or bearded claw and a lamina which may have a beard or cockscome-like crest or unicellular papillae or only a smooth ridge. Inner 3 are known as standard. Colour variation is very pronounced; either the whole flower is of uniform colouring or bicoloured; then falls are normally darker. Stamens 3 attached to hypanthium, opposite the falls. Style branches 3, petaloid, each branch arched over a stamen and the claw of the fall, bilobed at the tip; stigma is represented as a flap on the outer side of each style. Capsule many seeded, seeds arillate or non-arillate.

A genus of c. 300 species, distributed in Europe, Asia, N. Africa and North America; represented in Pakistan by 16 species.