dear iris ❤️'s i am new to this site. just joined tonight. but posted in the wrong forum. please look up shizen's post in the "general need help" forum. your replies would be greatly appreciated. had been an iris collector since the early 60’s.

but we moved and i had to leave all of my darlings behind.

sorry wrong forum. my question was posted in .ask a question"

shizen said:we. moved from a zone 9 to a zone 10. many of my favorite plants japanese maples, tree peonies, and japanese irises do not florish here in this heat, salt, and sandy area.

another of my favorites is the tall bearded iris and is listed as maximum 9 zone plant. i have ordered 11 irises (new varieties to me). do you think they will survive or will it be a constant struggle to keep them alive? are there tb that do better in the heat than others?

i did not want to try aril or arilbreds, as i have had little luck with them in the past.

i ordered: june krause, naughty nights, ocelot, damsel ina dress, afterlife, starring, mezmerizer, pinkness, stellar lights, his royal highness, and concertina; and now i'm wondering , iris aficionados if i made a big mistake? i haven't seen many tb's for sale in the nurseris around here.

also, during the months of july/aug. we have several weeks of monsoon moisture....hardly any rain with the humidity. we live about 2 mi. from the pacific ocean. the photo below is of 'afterlife'

Daphne, I hope you don't mind I quoted your post here. This way the answers will be in one place.
I live in zone 9, so I can't help you about the zone 10 question. I'm thinking with your monsoon moisture, but not much rain, that you'll be fine. With all the heat and humidity the folks back east are getting I don't think it is as much of a problem as you think. What I don't know about is how much little winter chill you get and what that will do to the Iris. Adding compost will help the sandy soil. People push zones all the time so I say plant them and see what they do.
I'm not surprised about the nursery not selling Iris because they are not in flower right now.
again, we all love pictures of Iris and would love to see your pictures too!

for your encouragement. this is a whole new venue for me in zone 10; not without many challenges. had to revamp my gardening skills, growing a lot more succulents and exotics now. (not too unfamiliar as i grew up with most of them)

I know that Betty @Betja used to have lots of irises in Bakersfield CA. Not sure what zone that would be. I know that she would pot her irises first to get them growing. That way she could move them out of the intense heat until they were well rooted, and then they could go into the ground later in the season after the temps went down some. I know that she couldn't get the miniature ones to do well there, but she has lots of pictures of her TB's in the data base, so they did well for her.

to the iris forum by the way!

shizen said: for your encouragement. this is a whole new venue for me in zone 10; not without many challenges. had to revamp my gardening skills, growing a lot more succulents and exotics now. (not too unfamiliar as i grew up with most of them)

Don't despair. Here is a picture of a successful grower out in the So Cal desert - Mystic Lake Gardens http://www.mysticlakegardens.c...



Not only do they grow TB, they have rebloomers, lots. In Zone 10 you can get rebloom that we in the colder areas seldom see. They get reblooms from Oct to February. I don't think this grower is too far from you, relatively speaking. You might pay them a visit. They are very involved in the iris society and seem like lovely people. They use ebay to sell their iris and I've bought from them before.

tveguy3 said: I know that she would pot her irises first to get them growing. That way she could move them out of the intense heat until they were well rooted, and then they could go into the ground later in the season after the temps went down some.
:

I also pot them up before planting since its to hot in the summer here in Northern California.

Greenwood Garden sells a lot of irises, and they are down in Somis, CA, not that far north of Los Angeles. http://www.greenwoodgarden.com... So it can be done. (Be aware that they have renamed at least one iris for sales purposes... they sell 'Rosalie Figge' under the name "Frequent Violet".)

Why would they do that, Poly?

You might have good luck with some of the rebloomers that seem to thrive with a longer growing season. Your local society is a great place to start, and they can direct you to cultivars that work best for your area.
http://www.sandiegoirissociety...

@Muddymitts

In their catalog, they have "(R. Figge)" after the "Frequent Violet" name, which is confusing. I asked them if it was BY Rosalie Figge (no such plant was AIS registered) or if it WAS 'Rosalie Figge'..., and was told the latter:

"...yes, our 'Frequent Violet' is the same plant as 'Rosalie Figge' but landscapers in our area had gotten used to our name. It got confusing enough that we just list it as 'Frequent Violet' in our catalog.

So it seems like for some reason they may have started calling (or describing) it as 'Frequent Violet' (perhaps in color contrast to the white 'Frequent Flyer' which they also sell, perhaps for other marketing reasons), then maybe tried to switch to the correct name, but that caused its own set of problems and they threw in the towel...

That practice (applying a "new" name to an existing iris) was one of the things that that AIS was founded to prevent, and countless hours of work, research, and sweat have gone into *trying* to make the "One name, one iris" a standard practice.

I applaud the efforts of the AIS . Having often been confused in selecting roses and lilies because they often have 2 or more names (usually for introduction in other countries and using a different language or names selected for marketing purposes), its something I have great appreciation for. Our database here lists alternate names and that is a big plus.

Stick with the registered name, it avoids confusion.

On August 2, 2013, Dave posted an article titled 'Solving the Mystery of the Black Diamond Crepe Myrtle Series'. A new member had asked if this plant was patented. The following is the gist of that article.

In an effort to answer the question, @woofie, @Horntoad, @eclayne, @Moonhowl and I all started looking into the situation.

It turns out that the Black Diamond™ series of crepe myrtles are in fact the exact same plants as the Ebony series of Crepe Myrtles produced by the breeding work of Dr. Cecil Pounders of the ARS-USDA. When you buy a Black Diamond crepe myrtle, you are in fact actually buying an Ebony crepe myrtle.

I contacted Dr. Pounders about all this, and he responded by saying, "Yes, Ebony Crapemyrtles and Black Diamond Crapemyrtles are the same clones under different names. Black Diamond Pure White is 'Ebony & Ivory'. BD Best Red is 'Ebony Flame'. BD Blush is 'Ebony Glow'. BD Crimson Red is 'Ebony Fire'. BD Red Hot is 'Ebony Embers'.

The Ebony names are the officially registered cultivar names and anyone is allowed to propagate and sell plants under the Ebony names without paying any fees. The practice of selling public domain plants under a trademark is legal and is not a new practice. You usually can identify the practice if you see a trademark plant tag with no ppaf or patent number listed."

So there you have it, Crepe Myrtle fans, straight from the horse's mouth.

So, when you go to an accredited nursery and buy a plant clearly marked...... I grow the Black Diamond Crimson Red which apparently is Ebony Fire.....

I depend on plant nurseries to play fair! I don't like this practice!