It's a Siberian iris. Can you put 5 mins into inches?

Has it always bloomed low in the foliage? Full sun? Adequate deep watering? Is it competing with tree or shrub roots?

Lol...good to know! I got this iris as a gift, was told that it was a Japanese iris (mistakenly), but she didn't know what kind. She did mention that it requires almost no care and multiplies at fast rate.

this is my 2nd summer with it. It has also multiplied like rabbits in my garden, too. She gave me a few fans and now there are two large clumps.

Good observation-yes, last year the bloom was low in the foliage, too.

Yes, it gets adequate deep watering. It is actually on the side of my house, which was designed to be the spillway for the yard, so it is the wettest spot in my yard. Additionally, I have a sprinkler system.

i do have a lot of trees planted in my yard -> 75 trees and countless bushes, hydrangeas, but of all the spots, this is the clearest from a living tree- probably about 10 ft from a young persimmon tree. This is my "Sandy bed," named after hurricane that took down 3 enormous (>40 ft trees), thus creating this newish bed, so doubtless there is a enormous root system from the dead trees that I had finish mother nature's job of taking out.

i will measure the height tomorrow (too dark now) and let you know. While the flower stems are short, the leaf blades and flower size are on par with my other Siberian iris, with the flower even being a bit larger.

Here is a short illustrated article. I. sanguinea tobataensis behaves like yours! The color is way too blue in the photo.
http://theamericanirissociety.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-missing-class-dwarf-siberians.html

Thanks for the article - interesting - I didn't realize there wasn't a "dwarf" siberian class.

Mine is 14" tall, so it falls squarely in that size range.

Based on your article, I did some additional searching and came up with "Iris sibirica subsp. orientalis." http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/80085/#b

Here is a picture from the article - looks like mine, don't you think, except when I searched it, again the pictures are more blue (like you mentioned), versus mine are 2-toned purple.

Oh boy. You'll be the best judge of how alike they are. That picture (above) from Dave's is a sanguinea aka orientalis. I think sanguinea is more commonly used.

Irisgal,

Thanks so much for your help! I really appreciate that you've been trying to help id my mystery iris.

You are so welcome!