Lestv said:
2) Can JI cross with LA's or TB's? I never had bee pods before this year, and then had bee pods on all three! Since very few JI bloomed this year I wonder if the pollen is crossed?

Technically....probably, just maybe hasn't happened yet because it's super difficult and no one is really trying it or understands why it happens to be able to more easily replicate it.

Most of the beardless iris have been crossed to some extent, some have never been registered so it looks like there's less of it going on but if you really start digging. I mean we know LA can cross with i.virginca which can cross with a bunch of others. There is an instance of i.fulva (a species LA) crossing with i.pseudacorus, i.pseudacorus has crossed with much of the beardless iris sections, including the siberians (which has crossed with pretty much everything i.pseudacorus hasn't...yet) so in theory it is probably possible for everything in there to cross just very rare and difficult to do. i.lactea is another that's crossed with a lot of the beardless iris sections...so if nothing else there are potential bridges.

There's also an instance by Christy Ann Hensler (passed away in 2013 so a lot of her species crosses, which are fairly unique, didn't reach their full potential) having had a sino-siberian produce a seed pod that produced bearded offspring, based on colour she assumes it was a SDB that was opposite it....they only pollinate with each other and most are sterile which indicates something unusual went on with those. Let me see if her page is still up, yay it is
https://www.povn.com/rock/Weis...

Very, very interesting!

I forgot one of the more known strange crosses that happens (and has been repeated) that shouldn't be possible....Paltec (and similar) between bearded (i.pallida) and crested (i.tectorum).

Having said that though, based on the seed picture I imagine most are selfs. Most reports on the wide sectional crosses tend to stress the seeds look deformed and the pods they come from usually have very few seed. But there's a lot of odd crosses that have resulted in unique irises out there which demonstrate the possibility that all the rhizome iris can interbreed...just possibly very very rarely and generally resulting in sterile offspring at the diploid level.

If my seedlings survive to bloom I guess I will find out.

Yes you will.

And even then you may not be sure if because one parent may have very dominant genes (like most i.pseudacorus hybrids will look like i.pseudacorus, just maybe slightly off coloured foliage or plant size until you get to the f2 generation) :D Realistically though, most wide crosses with iris these days seem to be happy accidents so fingers crossed.

I will be happy if I can actually get a few to thrive and bloom. This is very much a first attempt for me with the Japanese iris. If some added color besides the purple is thrown in then I would be over the moon.

Good luck!
As long as you remember to post pictures before take-off!