Thomas Jefferson Encyclopedia

Bird-Foot Violet

Viola pedata

A hardy, spring-flowering North American perennial with brightly colored, five-petaled flowers; the upper 2 petals are deep violet and the lower 3 pale lavender.

Homer D. House, New York State Botanist. Walter B. Starr of the Matthews-Northrup Company, Buffalo, and Harold H. Snyder of the Zeese-Wilkinson Company, New York, photographers, 1918/PD
In Bloom
April–June
Growth Type
Perennial
Hardiness
4 - 8
Conditions
Prefers full to filtered sunlight and dry, rocky or sandy soil
Colors
Lavender, Violet

Also known commonly as Crowfoot, this shy, solitary violet with its leaves resembling a bird's foot, is found in the barren soils of upland woods and dry, sunny clearings throughout much of the Eastern United States. Plants were first sent to Europe during the 1750s and named by Linnaeus. Eighteenth-century Virginia gardener Jean Skipwith, Lady Skipwith was likely referring to this charming species as the "cut-leaved" wild violet "with a pansy flower" that she grew among her sweet-scented violets at Prestwould.1 J. E. Teschemacher, writing in the Horticultural Register (1835), recommended Viola pedata for rock gardens.2

- Peggy Cornett, n.d.

Further Sources

Footnotes

  1. Ann Leighton, American Gardens in the Eighteenth Century (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1986), 486.
  2. J.E. Teschemacher, "On Artificial Rock Work," Horticultural Register, and Gardener's Magazine 1 (1835): 459.