Kent--thank you for posting the pictures & the commentary.

My blue noid has opened.




I know there isnt much difference but I am a proud mama.This clump is 3 years old.

Beautiful photos Kent -- beautiful Irises. I'm in the middle of bloom season here too. Shall I post a picture or two?

Here's *Amiable* -- blooming the first time for me.



*Sweeter Than Wine* -- and oldie but a goodie.


*Fogbound*


*Designer Art*


Here's a reeeeeeel oldie -- purchased in 1976 -- *Blue Reflection* -- I love the color!


And something a little more recent -- *Starring*


Most of mine have been around for awhile. I always wait until the price comes down before buying. I want too many of them, and it gets expensive!!

What a thrill

What a cutie Jo Ann!
And Kent and Mary Ann, all lovely blooms, I really like the striking contrast of the orange beards against the dark background of Lady Of The Night and Starring is another coloring that I always find attractive, reminds me of blooms like Secret Service and Connection.

Fantastic blooms, Mary Ann -- I'm familiar with all of them except BLUE REFLECTION, and I love the ruffles and wonderful lighter blue color on BLUE REFLECTION.

And Jo Ann, I love your little NOID. Just love those little rays, or eyelashes, or whatever they call them, with those light colored beards!

So Sue, when are you going to visit Napa Country? I see their visitor days are April 27-May 20 this year -- and I can't wait to see those pictures!

Well I guess I will have to plan a visit! I just read that they are open Fridays too, I prefer that over a weekend date. They are almost 1 hr drive away.

I just checked their website and here's what they've posted:

Our initial open dates for the display garden will be April 27 through May 20. We will be open Friday, Saturday and Sunday only during this period. Hours are 10am-5pm. The garden will be closed Monday through Thursday.


Needless to say, I need to get my Napa Country iris fix through you -- And I do hope that if you get there you can take pictures of their new introductions, etc. -- I need those vicarious thrills!

By the way, has your HAWAIIAN RAIN bloomed for you yet? I dearly love that iris, and on Tuesday a friend and I went down to the San Fernando Valley to visit Randy Squires' garden. (He's the hybridizer of HR.) I posted a thread about our trip over in the Irises Cubit, if you're interested.

Thanks for the compliments ladies. My Irises are out-doing themselves this year -- wonderful quantities of blossoms -- it's a sea of color out there!!

Betty -- here's a clump shot that I took this morning of *Blue Reflection*


And that's just half of that particular planting of BR!

And on the reverse -- here's a huge disappointment.......


That is my first ever bloom on *Halloween Trick* -- what's up with that? What's going on with an Iris when it has aberrant blooms like this? Should I dig it up and throw the rhizome away?

No Betty, HAWAIIAN RAIN has not sent up a bloom yet, I still have many in pots, they are all doing fine and I look everyday for anything new. Sometimes those little ones sneak one out on me.

It bloomed really early for me this year, but this is the first year I got several stalks. I absolutely adore that iris, but she's stingy on blooms (poor branching, etc.) -- but the flowers are incredible and huge, and after my plants got going the flowers are now chest-high on me! So please don't give up on it yet. I just waited five years to see a flower on ENCHANTER, and boy was it ever worth it!

Mary Ann, your clump of BLUE REFLECTION is absolutely breathtaking! Don't you just love it when they produce like that? I have some that give me multiple stalks right off the bat and continue to do so each year, and then there are the sluggish ones! HALLOWEEN TRICK is one of those, I think. I got rid of it after a year, but my sis who inherited it really likes it -- a very stingy bloomer for her too, though. It seems like some of the Ghios are really vigorous, gorgeous, etc., and then there are some that just never do anything here. So I like to stick to his frilly, ruffled, gorgeous ones and he usually throws in some of the others for me to try. PICTURE BOOK is my favorite pink, and he originally gave me that as a bonus plant. So you just never know what you'll get. And some irises from other hybridizers do the same thing. Everyone loves the pink HAPPENSTANCE by Keith Keppel, and it looked pretty bad here and just dwindled away. You never know...

Sue, I would recommend you try to get HAWAIIAN RAIN into the ground, and I bet it'll really take off for you.

Just beautiful.

Yes -- but what I don't understand about blooms like that is -- will every flower on the bloom stalk be the same? Will that rhizome produce that bloom stalk every time? Or is that just an aberration of that bloom that time? I've had a couple of plants produce odd blooms this year -- Crystal Gazer (a young plant for me) produced one stalk of beautiful correct blooms, and another stalk that was totally different -- produced white flowers with little ruffling and only a dab of blue at the center of the bloom. These are two different rhizomes off the same mother rhizome that I planted last year. I've only ever seen this once or twice before in my life -- I guess I've been lucky, all of my Irises bloom true to what they should be. So this is confusing to me.

Yeah -- that *Blue Reflections* blooms like mad for me, and increases the same way! Want some?

Occasionally, with first year bloom you might get flowers that are smaller and "plainer" than expected. This is especially true if the plants didn't grow well the previous summer/fall. They usually look a lot better in subsequent years.

Aha! So -- I'll keep the rhizome, and hope for better things in the future. Thanks Kent!

Mary Ann, changing weather during the time the stalk and buds are developing can really affect how the blooms look. And different blooms on the same stalk can sometimes look different from each other too. Also, I learned the hard way that you should NEVER use Roundup anywhere near irises. They can come out really deformed. And also, mutations can occur at any time that can change the color and look of a flower -- but that doesn't necessarily mean it's a genetic mutation that will occur in the next rhizome and stalk too. I know from growing mini roses that suddenly a branch can produce a different color of flowers, and you can cut the branch off and root it to get a new color for that plant, which they call a "sport". It doesn't affect the original plant, though.

I know my gardeners managed to get too close to my MYSTIQUE with their little wand and Roundup a few weeks ago, and the resulting blooms on the two stalks look so different from MYSTIQUE you would swear it's a totally different plant -- absolutely no ruffling at all, extremely narrow falls, etc. But that plant sticks out a bit from my bed and my gardeners are fairly careless with their little wand, and I'm sure some spray drift hit it -- and it'll probably be all right next year, although I'll move it if I can.

Ohhhhhh yes Roundup mistakes.

We have had changing weather. It got hot real early, then we had a couple nights of frost just last week. The Iris in question is on the north side ofthe house, as well. I was surprised that my full-bloom blooms didn't get damaged with that frost (two nights of it), so maybe that accounts for it. I'll leave it where it is and give it another year. It's a very young plant -- one fan, one bloom stalk.

I do use RoundUp, and I do it use around my Irises. But I am oh-so-careful -- only spray on still days, low-volume spray near the ground but not near the foliage, etc. I didn't know that it could deform buds, although I learned some years ago that it can sure kill Irises!! Had a grouping of Irises around my mailbox, and it got invaded with Bermuda grass. Very difficult area to do any digging to remove the Bermuda that way, so I decided to spray the area with RoundUp. Well -- it killed the Bermuda alright, but the Irises as well. :sad:

RoundUp is some serious business.

Ohhhh yeaaah 'been there.

Well, Betty, seems like it was worth the wait on Enchanter ha? I've had some problems with my AOL, and couldn't navigate too well for a while, Seems to be better now. Kent, good to see you didn't get blown away during that last rash of storms that went through your state. I've still only had SDB's blooming, and we've had so many night of frost, some temps in the 20's, that some of them look a bit stressed. I have several TB stalks up now, and should have one or two open within a week, if it just stays warmer in the nights. Mexican Holiday is close, and Cat Call isn't far behind it. Here's a couple of pics of some of the little ones. It's been hard to get good pics with having this wet cold weather, but here's a couple anyway.
I have Lepard's print blooming, but can't seem to get a good shot of it.
Ruby Tuesday and Casper's shadow clump


Aladin's Flame and Yummy Accents


Red At Last