The blooms here continue to be very confused. Most of my early and very early irises show no sign of blooming, but several of my Medium and Medium/Late irises are forming bloom stalks. Of the ones that are blooming the stalks tend to be very short on many of them this year.

Here are my Very Early irises (most of which are not showing any signs of blooming):

Adoree VE-M
Anthology VE-EM
Babylon Queen VE
Center Ice VE -E
Clear Choice VE
Dance For Joy VE-EM
Day On The Bay VVE
Fancy Woman VE-EM
Stop The Traffic VE-M ( beginning to form a bloom stalk)


The irises that have bloom stalks forming are:

April Jewel M
Autumn Explosion EM (Re)
Autumn Thunder EML (Re)
Beachgirl EML (should be open in a day or 2)
Blue Fin ML
Boysenberry Buttercup EM
Cascadian Rhythm EM
Celtic Prince M
Clarence M (Re)
Cold Creek ML (Re)
Cosmic Celebration EM
Desert Sonata EM
Ennoble ML (starting to open today)
Fantasy Ride EM
Glo-Ray Hallelujah EM
Head Games M
High Master ML
Jesse's Song M (Re)
Return To Sender M (Re)
Tanya Lynn M
Total Recall EML (Re)


These ones are blooming now:

Mauna Loa Fire M
Jurassic Park E-M (Re)
Pure As Gold L (Re)
Wings Of Peace E-M
White Noid (not Skating Party) Unknown

A second walk around the garden and I realize that the
short iris showing color isn't Wintry Sky, it's Nassau Blue, a dwarf.
Not as weird as I thought.

Oh -- I hope you're right, Tom. Daylilies too, do you think?

Bizarre, Marilyn -- everything everything is mixed up this year.

Jan -- glad it's a dwarf that is short!!

Still fighting aphids. I have resorted to The Squish Method.

I will freely confess to being as obsessive about my iris as anyone here but I think that maybe we watch them to close sometimes. I worked hard in the yard yesterday so took a day off today......here is Canary Isle which is one of the first medians I grew....









Here are a few that I didn't get planted last fall. Have room in one of the front rose beds....

Our iris and daylilies never get mulched.....except maybe by snow .....and they don't seem to mind ! In fact ,I think any mulch on the iris this time of year might be a big no-no, as it would hold too much moisture

That is a lovely little SDB, Paul. I love that color combination and being a SDB makes it just right. LOL

I mulch my Daylilies, not for protections as much as convenience. Less weeding, less pre-embergent. It also holds moisture which they like.

OK -- I'll stop pulling off last years Daylily leaves, which serve as a sort of mulch. The Irises and the Peonies are on their own -- for the most part, it's too late anyway. Most of them are cleaned up and exposed.

Thanks for talking about it, guys!!

I think they will pull through, but sending warm thoughts, and air, your way!

I have quite a few fans with crinkled leaves and such from the late ice storm. Wonder if I will end up with many chimera when they bloom. Poor Elvis Dreamer has one whole fan growing sideways..... guess it will be more than just fuzzy this year!

Okay...chimera?

I took pictures of Iris blooms.

I do too, Leslie. I know they will still function but I wonder about the blooms and bloom stalks. Last year Protocol and Jewel Baby both had four sets of falls and standards. I really don't know what to expect but I am just waiting for the show and hoping for the best. We are supposed to get frost this weekend but that is to be expected thru early April so if no blooms are open, and with the exception of a little MDB mine are not showing color, it should not hurt them.

Yay Barb!!

Paul -- *here*, obsession is appreciated!!!

I have been lax on cleanup but the iris had a lot of mottled leaves on the ground that had been stuck in the ice. I cut down the dead stuff and pulled up the mottled (fungus'd) leaves and in the process gave the new growth a bit of a hair cut. Didn't realize they were growing. Am very pleased. These are just three that I bought at a local nursery that seem to be tough enough to survive our winter and wetness. Planted some other tall ones in the middle of the rhubarb last year and it will be interesting to see how they do. I got them from a DG friend while most I have in pots in the garage doing very well. Except for aphids which I wash down regularly with a soap water garlic concoction. I let them get away last year and sorely regretted it as it spread to darn near everything else and killed all 12 of my tomato plants.

34° so I am hoping for more snow melt.

44 here and I'm heading out to work at 11:00.

Good for you Arlene!

Zencat said:Okay...chimera?

When an iris has environmental stresses during it's growth, such as late frost, it sometimes produces an unusual bloom, such as with four or more standards and falls as Bonnie mentioned, or sometimes two falls. It can also be blooms with their normal color pattern mixed up. These anomalies are called chimera.

Here are a few examples:

World Premier with half the fall the color of the standard instead:



Footloose with two standards and two falls:



And Again and Again with falls and very short standards (this was a rebloom in late November, definitely affected by cold):