Boxed up last of left over iris to mail. Have one large box of NOIDs to give away.
Any takers see my post today: Leftover Iris--NOIDs by SJButler

I printed out and re-tagged 2 dozen irises,When I started out a while back, I had nearly 500 to re-tag. Now I just have 200 or so left to do. The printed labels look so nice.

A side-effect of printing all these names is the realization that I have so many that haven't bloomed yet, and asking myself if I should give the acquisition of more a break this year.

Never give up, Jan, whether it's tagging or acquisitioning!

janwax said:I printed out and re-tagged 2 dozen irises,When I started out a while back, I had nearly 500 to re-tag. Now I just have 200 or so left to do. The printed labels look so nice.

A side-effect of printing all these names is the realization that I have so many that haven't bloomed yet, and asking myself if I should give the acquisition of more a break this year.

Oh no, do we need a IAA intervention??

I'm thinking the same and have been for a month or two now, Jan. I have loaded garden and don't know what will or won't bloom yet. Last year was a late start into the season and it showed with the low number of blooms.

I almost felt bad to NOT order this upcoming year, but will limit myself to a shockingly low number instead. I wonder who the lucky vendor(s) will be??

Otherwise got home to late to do jack squat outside.

Back to unburying iris thanks to Matthew. I am right to the section with all the losses. Will be building a ditch through this part of the garden for better drainage. That said, the iris near the drip line from the roof are growing REALLY well. Thought they would be subject to rot but no. Doctor Who is becoming a giant, Indian Chief has large increases, Florentina is going crazy.

And I have to say that Enter The Dragon and Dragon Dance are the most robust Blyth iris I have ever had. Don't know why but they are just phenomenal.

The ones in my lily garden have received water almost daily and have only gotten stronger in the last couple weeks. Way less humidity though and cooler nights/mornings..

Do you have the lily beetles in your area, Gabe? I gave up on lilies because of them.

Lucy I had the lily beetles last year but this year had none at all. I planted a buffet for them too, almost 100 new lilies, but not one appeared!

Hi Y'all! I'm just checking in again. I have finally had some time recently to work on my irises. I have a ways to go but I'm feeling a lot better about them. I lost a lot this year due to the lack of water and the lack of energy to hand water them. Why hand water them you ask? That is because most of them are in pots or areas of the yard without irrigation (why so many are in pots is another story).

Anyway I lost around 50-60 which I will post in goners when I get the final list...but the rest are coming back well. I still have a few that are struggling and my plants may not bloom well this year but at least the majority of them survived!

I had a nice surprise today while I was working. I almost overlooked it but there was a rebloom stalk forming on Living On The Edge! I didn't expect any rebloom this year due to the lack of water but I guess the recent rain got this plant excited!!





And for those of you who think you have too many pots I'll have to get you an updated photo of my iris field (aka the nursery...cause that's what it looks like). This is a picture from about a week ago. The pots on the left have all been moved out into the sun (away from the tree - this photo was taken very late in the day), except for the ones that are goners. (Note: I have not had time to trim the brown tips off the leaves yet)



I have a whole bunch of irises that need to be re-potted. This is what happens when you plant irises in a 1 gallon pot thinking they will only be there for a few months....but you don't get them planted!

Marilyn,
I am sorry you lost so many . Wow! - you have a lot of pots.

Told you Living on the Edge is a performer. It's not listed as a rebloomer, but it blooms three times a year for me. Well it wont this year since I only kept one rhizome of it. Just a word of warning, once it blooms, it will grow like crazy.

Sorry you lost so many this year!

Thanks for the condolences...but given the level of neglect I feel like I got off easy.

Thanks also for the warning on Living On The Edge. I'll keep an eye on it. It may have to go in the section of ones needing bigger pots soon.

Lestv said:

And I have to say that Enter The Dragon and Dragon Dance are the most robust Blyth iris I have ever had. Don't know why but they are just phenomenal.

Enter the Dragon is growing like crazy like it does every summer and is looking great, but in the spring it will loose every potential bloom to rot, and then come back strong entering the winter looking great. It has bloomed only a couple times here in about 5 or 6 years.

irisarian said:Do you have the lily beetles in your area, Gabe? I gave up on lilies because of them.

No lily beetles hear, just wabbits. New sprouts appearing and being eaten already

Sorry for the losses Marilyn. I wish I had that much area to pot up. There'd only be walking rows remaining.

Enter bloomed for me last year with no losses. I had many iris with bloom stalks that rotted as soon as the last bud opened but Enter The D was fine. Had that problem though with Puff The Magic so I will keep an eye on them.

Lestv said:
And I have to say that Enter The Dragon and Dragon Dance are the most robust Blyth iris I have ever had. Don't know why but they are just phenomenal.

Happy to hear it! I am slightly worried about how the Tempo Two irises I have just ordered (including EtD and DD) will do here. They recommend that you pot them up when you receive them and put them somewhere protected to avoid late frosts. Sure wish I had a greenhouse.

I know some of you in colder zones like me have received rhizomes from Australia. What did you do and how did it turn out?

Today in my iris garden, I managed to get started on the last round of weeding for the year, which I have put off for far too long. The 'volunteer' Columbines had taken over most of the main iris bed and in the free draining iris soil, they develop very long and thick taproots and they like to grow riiiight next to the iris rhizomes, where it is next to impossible to dig them out without disturbing the iris roots.

I also managed to trim all the fans that had been chewed by little brown snails, which seem to be everywhere this year. My poor irises had long trailing tufts of brown, exposed fibers hanging from the semi-eaten leaves. At least they look much better now and I got rid of a lot of the snails in the process! Ha!

The other good news is that two of my 'leafless potato' rhizomes put out little, green increases!

Today I'm going to take this year's seeds out of the fridge and give them the Tea Treatment that I read about here.

http://www.srgc.net/forum/inde...

That's really interesting, Jan - I think I'll give it a go next time...