Collinsia:n. A North American genus of
plants of the
Scrophulariaceae (
figwort) family noted mainly for their
flowers.
This
genus was named after
Zaccheus Collins.
Examples include:
Collinsia heterophylla (Chinese Houses, Innocence);
Collinsia parviflora (Blue-eyed-mary);
Collinsia sparsiflora (Few-flowered blue-eyed-mary, Spinster's
Blue-eyed-mary).
Collinsia blooms look much like snapdragons, and almost all of these plants come in beautiful blues, which gives us all the "blue-eyed-mary" names, although some species display deep violets, lavender, rosy reds, and can sometimes fade to almost white. Franciscan blue-eyed mary (Collinsia multicolor) is a particularly ditinguished member of the genus due to its coloring, as the Latin name suggests.