As I have mentioned in at least a couple of threads, I am having a disappointing amount of bloom this season. This, in spite of throwing around quite a lot of 5-10-5 (and a little superphosphate) starting back in mid February.
Now, my garden has a fair amount of shade, and I am sure that over the years the amount of shade has grown. I have to question whether the scarcity of iris bloom is a function of perhaps not fertilizing enough (maybe I should be fertilizing in the fall, too?) or of not enough sun.
If my problem is the latter, then maybe I should be looking at growing shade tolerant irises (instead of the large number of bearded irises that I just ordered
).
Coincidental to buying some other plants, I recently purchased 2 Iris x 'Nada' from Greenwood Garden, because this plant is supposedly suited to dry shade.
The Pacific Coast Iris seedlings at the show yesterday were so beautiful, that I did a search on them. (In my area I think they can do with some shade. I used to have some PCIs (the landscaper put them in so I don't know if any of these were named cultivars). Most of them had ugly colors and didn't tolerate shade well, but one was somewhat pretty and bloomed in part shade. I am now regretting getting rid of it.)
In my search, up popped Annie's Annuals, with a listing. While their PCIs weren't currently available, their
Iris confusa plants were.
Now, those
confusa look interesting, but it is unclear how rapidly they spread. I am considering taking a chance on 'Chengdu', but I was wondering if anyone had experience with this genus of irises - is this plant going to take over my garden?
And since I am looking at shade irises, does anyone have any recommendations for any other kinds of irises that will tolerate shade? Or, for that matter, for
bearded iris cultivars that will tolerate shade?
