I Am Crap, Me

[akirlu]

Please admire the nice bearded iris. Snapping a few shots in the garden is literally the only productive thing I've done all day. Low. Energy. Day.

I'm off to buy more pots.

Comments

[sartorias.livejournal.com]

Those are gorgeous!

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Thanks! I can take no credit. They came with the house and all I have done is neglect them. But I continue to be charmed to discover what all "came with the house".

[athenais.livejournal.com]

Lovely! I miss being able to grow the big bearded iris. They do well further down the peninsula, but have to be babied and sheltered up here in the Wind Tunnel.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

So pretty!

[laurel]

I should know the name of that one, it's on the tip of my tongue, but I can't think of it. Looks like one of the classic oldies.

(Grew up a member of the American Iris Society and Iris Society of Minnesota-- I have way too much knowledge of irises but unfortunately seem to have forgotten most names.)

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

It wouldn't surprise me to learn that the iris are an old classic -- I suspect most of the garden was planted by the older couple who had the house before the previous owner. One of the established roses is Peace, and you can't get much more old classic than that.

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Gee, I remember when 'Peace' was introduced, though I didn't get a plant of it until three or four years later (and lost that one a decade or so ago).

But back to Irises -- yes, when that part of the garden looks like a cobblestone pavement, with all the old rhizomes, it's time to replant -- and to be firm in resisting the temptation to try to save every bit (including the old "back-bulbs") that might possibly grow.

For some reason, I'm thinking about the yard I saw in the neighborhood while crashing with fans in St. Paul, MN, some years back. The owner had built a gridwork of 2X4s forming at least fifty c. 1-foot squares, with a single Iris rhizome, carefully labeled, planted in each. (That was a couple of blocks away from the house that had an enormous mixed (perennial and annual) border containing about thirty species of plants that I could identify -- every one of them being medicinal, poisonous or psychotropic. The Twin Cities contain some Rather Strange People, you know.) My tendency, in your situation, would be to try to find/clear enough space to set out a representative selection of divisions singly, far enough apart that they could be labeled (as to color, anyhow) when they bloom, to assure saving at least one of each different kind, and go for the more showy clumps of several plants of the same variety in a few years, but maybe you don't have The Completist Collector outlook. (Not that I'm sufficiently well-organized to carry this off, mind you.)

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

There's much to be said in favor of the Classics -- the Old Favorites -- in Iris (and in Daylilies). Every year sees the introduction of many spectacular new cultivars (partly because they make money for the breeder only the first few years, after which the people who bought them are giving divisions to their friends) but -- increasingly -- many of these are delicate, fussy, and difficult to grow (which, I insist, Nature did not intend either Iris or Hemerocallis to be). The Classics tend to be workhorses, and that's what most gardeners (including me) both want and need.

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

I absolutely want and need workhorses in the garden. I am willing to go to some degree of fuss with the roses, but by and large I am a haphazard and negligent gardener at the best of times, so I need to have plants that are tough and sturdy and good at fending for themselves, because sooner or later, they will have to.

The southern edge of the iris bed looks as thick as you describe. The northern edge is less dense, but as I watch the sun move across the yard over the course of the day, I think the iris in the less-crowded part of the bed are failing to bloom due to lack of sun -- the apple tree overshadows them too much of the day.

[mjlayman.livejournal.com]

We used to give my grandfather a new rose on his birthday and I remember giving Peace.

[don-fitch.livejournal.com]

Workhorses are Good, yes (& I put roses in that category). For me, something that's turning into one is Alstroemeria ("Peruvian Lily") -- named after the botanist who introduced the potato into Scandinavia (the A really ought to have a little o above it, I think). If you don't have any, you might want to consider them. Or Maybe Not -- one (non-fan) Seattle Area gardener considers them an extremely pretty noxious weed, difficult to eradicate because they disburse their seeds widely and because they can re-grow from small bits of the pencil-size rhizome, but I don't find them that bad (and some cultivars seem to be much less thuggish). Here, they usually produce masses of azalea-like blooms, on c. 3-foot stems, for a couple of months in Spring (just finishing now) and again in Autumn, dying back to the ground for a few months in midsummer and midwinter (except for the couple of times they've continued to grow and bloom for 14 consecutive months, for no apparent reason). They are attractive to (and can be devastated by) slugs & snails, but mine have had no problems with other pests. They're not fragrant, but do well as cut flowers -- especially as fillers in mixed bouquets or arrangements, and come in a fairly wide range of colors nowadays (Dutch and Ecuadorian growers have been hybridizing them for the commercial flower market, and these cultivars are slowly making their way into the home-nursery trade here). [Addendum: A quick check of the Sunset Garden Book suggests that some species/strains/cultivars are evergreen in mild climates. My impression is that you can't be sure about any of them until you grow them (& that divisions obtained from other gardeners may take two years to get well established).]

[akirlu.livejournal.com]

Ah, yes, I recognize Alstroemerias. You find them filling large beds around the University (pick one, but I meant UW). I was, mistakenly I gather, calling them day lillies. Certainly the guy who brought potatoes to Sweden deserves at least a lily named after him. That was a very big deal indeed.

At the moment, though, my focus isn't so much adding more flower beds so much as figuring out where I could (next year, at this point) put some gooseberries and raspberries and maybe even wild strawberries if I can get some seed.