Well image I could plant but only have two spuria to plant, but working on the webpage as must push before surgery on the 16th, have to get things that only I can do done and then Cass will finish the links

D

Beautiful Avatar. Dee....

Thank you Charleen

Well tomorrow I will plant my two spuria and the darn garlic that just keeps calling my name all the time now.

D

I have made such a big headway in the webpage for next year, I could almost post it now, but will wait as need to do final links all before the 15th
D

Clear the grass from a batch of MTB seedlings yesterday. that is it for the winter; damp ground=wet gloves & cold fingertips.

Charleen,
What a beautiful fall bloom! I had one similar, brought the unopened bud in and forgot to get a picture when it opened. My Iris was ''Total Recall'' and was given to me. It was the first time I saw it bloom.

Betty,
Your's has a beautiful bloom too!
Prayers for a successful surgery and good healing. I sure hope you can get back in the garden that soon!

Although I have posted here on the iris forum a couple of times, I am not sure I posted anything here in this thread.

So, about me: After my marriage imploded several years ago, I went back to gardening, something I didn't have the time, energy or money to do while raising my kids. Iris & daylilies are flowers my father loved, so I returned to what I knew.

I started at the local society sales. And initially had my daylilies and iris together in the same bed. After all. when the TB quit, the daylily start, right? Well it works good on paper, and in theory, but not in real life. So last year I separated my TB's and daylilies. Then a fellow gardener (from the other forum) sent me a HUGE box of TB's. Plus the ones I ordered - I had discovered Schreiners & Keppel - and my single mixed bed became not one, but two dedicated Iris beds, which are both full.

And now, everyone here keeps posting the 2012 intros - and LINKS! Talk about enablers! Geez.

Happy New Year everyone~ Jan

Sounds great Jan

hybridize--then you can worry about your own seedlings ☺

Hi Jan, I think I said welcome to you before, but welcome I again. I remember you from DG, right? Glad you're here.

Happy New Year everyone!

Happy Blooming New Year!!!!

Happy New Years, all!

Hello, my name is Rick and I am new here today. Happy New Year to all. I had joined the Cubits website but there was a link and an invitation to come here and so here I am. Last year my wife and I shared a vegetable garden with others in our building but it was a very cold and wet short growing season and so things like tomatoes didn't do very well although they were big and bushy the tomatoes were very green and small. I am very new to gardening and this year hopefully, I want to build a solar greenhouse garden. I have a structure design in mind but I am also learning that heating it at least for me may be difficult as it can get fairly expensive. I rent so what I am doing will be have to be portable so instead of building raised beds which would be preferable, is it possible to grow edible plants in large buckets? That doesn't sound very realistic does it? I am in Montana and right now we are currently having a very mild winter so far but that could change in a real hurry and usually does. I have several old books, one on solar greenhouse gardening, the other is about growing but is more of a manual. In all actuality I was going to try to build something that covered 200+ sq. feet and has a low ceiling probably about 6 1/2+ ft tall. Is a water tank for thermal mass very effective or could one do without? I was hoping on starting to plant in early March and see how far I could get to the end of the growing season. What we experienced in 2011 was a short growing season and so things were planted late. There are still a lot of variables I am dealing with right now such as expense, permissions, what type of greenhouse poly to buy and all around approval from the rest of the tenants. Glad to be here and thanks. Rick

Hi Rick,

So glad to have you here and on Cubits too. Please stick with us on both sites, we discuss different things on each.

As far as any greenhouse questions go, Irises probably won't be the place to get answers. I would try one of the forums. I did search for greenhouse and here's what I came up with

http://garden.org/search/index...

I would even imagine our fearless leader, Dave, would have knowledge of greenhouse constructions.

So, you might want to look in some of the other forums for greenhouse info, but please stick here with us on irises!

Happy New Years to you, and glad you found us.

I have been successful growing tomatoes in large containers. I'm sure other things would work.

Hi Rick welcome.

Welcome Rick...

Hi Jan,
I love your story about the iris!

Hi Rick,
I look forward to your solar greenhouse! You really don't have a very long growing season do you?

Thank you all for the warm welcome. Thanks PollyK for the greenhouse link, I will check it out. Paul2032, I may just start some things in buckets also and then move them to the outside garden, but I have heard so much about greenhouse gardening I'd like to to see how long a growing season can be extended inside a greenhouse and will try growing in buckets. I can take critique if you have any advice for me. It will probably be awhile but I will post some pics later and ask questions. I would definitely take counsel from all especially if you think I am doing something wrong. @ billyporter, Last year was kind of odd weather and even now it is unseasonably warm with little precipitation. I really am new to this so I am just learning. Thanks again to all for the nice welcome! Rick

Rick, from my brief experience as a grower in a hoop-type greenhouse, tomato plants do great and form very nice root systems at about 40º. If you care to do a few plants that you can put out during warmer days and bring in at night, that should give you a pretty good jump. To my experience (and I've had some concur and some agree) vegetables are fine started indoors, but need a lot more light than we can give them; only the sun will do.

If you're not ready for the greenhouse, cold frames (can be a few straw bales with a plastic sheet or old window frame really does good stuff, too - you just have to be sure to vent it on sunny days or you'll have fried green tomato plants...

Alright, now tell us what irises you would like to try, lol!