Help with identification please... [Iris]

oooOIOooo via pbs pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net
Sat, 02 May 2020 14:51:35 PDT
Hi Matt,

That is a nice one. Have you tried fertilizing heavily during periods of growth? Most garden Iris flower even more spectacularly with plentiful fertilizer. I think there's a good chance it could make more than two flowers per stem. Soils in the coastal Pacific Northwest often are quite low in soluble nutrients due to the plentiful rain.

I do think there's a good chance you could sell rhizomes on marketplaces like eBay. And consider donating small extra rhizomes to our Pacific Bulb Society Bulb Exchange. You can read about that here:
https://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbslist/2020-April/…
In climates like yours, the best time to lift and divide rhizomatous Iris is late fall, just after the first good frost, and again in early Spring, before growth begins. Lift clumps; cut off single front growths with a fan of leaves; cut the leaves down to a small fan. Make them look like the ones in garden centers. If the leaves are mostly dead it is fine to cut the fan almost all the way to the rhizome. A this stage they no longer produce food for the plant, but are convenient handles. Luminita Vollmer, our Bulb Exchange director, has a size limit of 5cm on plants she can fit into the largest boxes she uses. Smaller Iris divisions root and grow just as well as do larger divisions, but people paying for them through online marketplaces expect big rhizomes.

Which reminds me... Here in metro Phoenix, the best time to divide Iris germanica hybrids is after the spring flowering, when it's getting very hot, and they have entered summer dormancy. These dormant rhizomes quickly take off growing when planted in more temperate climates than ours. I have four unnamed garden Iris hybrids I will probably be dividing soon. Pure white concolor; palest blue/grey concolor; clear purple/blue concolor; yellow standards/burgundy falls. Years ago these were considered show quality varieties by the local Sun Country Iris Society. Pack rats took the tags. Does anybody want me to send some to the BX?

Leo Martin
Phoenix Arizona USA
Zone 9?

Sent with [ProtonMail](https://protonmail.com/) Secure Email.
_______________________________________________
pbs mailing list
pbs@lists.pacificbulbsociety.net
http://lists.pacificbulbsociety.net/cgi-bin/…


More information about the pbs mailing list