Wild rose, the state flower of Iowa

How to recognize it

The wild prairie rose is a low, long-lived shrub, usually one and a half to three feet tall in the open, though it can reach about eight feet. It often dies back nearly to the ground each winter and grows again from the base. Its stems are densely covered with small prickles. The leaves are compound, three to four inches long, with five to eleven toothed leaflets.

The flowers are what you notice: five petals in shades of pink, sometimes white, around a center of many yellow stamens, often in small clusters, with deeper pink buds. They bloom from about June through late summer. After the flowers fade, the plant produces colorful hips that stay on into fall and winter.

A native of the prairie

The prairie rose is native to the middle of the continent, from Alberta and Ontario south to Indiana and Texas, growing in prairies and along roadsides and ditches. Wild roses of several kinds grow throughout Iowa. The prairie rose is valuable to native bees, including bumblebees, which visit its open flowers.

Where to see it

Look for wild roses on Iowa’s remnant and restored prairies, along roadsides and in ditches, from June through late summer. Prairie preserves and roadside plantings of native species are good places to find them.

Chosen for a battleship

The wild rose became Iowa’s flower because of a ship. In 1897 the state presented a silver service to the new battleship USS Iowa, and the wild rose was among the designs decorating it. That same year, on May 7, 1897, the General Assembly adopted the wild rose as the state flower by resolution.

The resolution did not name a species, so the symbol is the wild rose in general. Iowa’s Official Register identifies the wild prairie rose as the one most often cited, giving it an older scientific name, Rosa pratincola, now treated as part of Rosa arkansana. North Dakota also has the wild prairie rose as its state flower.