Iris non-bearded 2017

[Lesley Cox]

SPCNI have a wonderful seedlist and the plants give some great surprises. There are seeds from registered named forms and also from mixed oddments of all kinds as well as from the original species. It's very easy (and cheap) to join as an Online member and well-rewarding. They do a great illustrated newsletter too.

My experience with the seed(lings) is that they can take 2 or 3 years to flower but need good care and feeding to do it in 2. Mine don't like to remain potted for long and don't really flower in pots much so better to plant them out quickly. The main problem with them is that there are so many seedlings and it seems wicked to throw any out before flowering as ever one is different, sometimes spectacularly so. So give it a go Gordon!

[Carolyn]

Lesley,
What do you feed your PC iris seedlings with? Dilute tomato fertiliser perhaps? I wish mine would flower in 2 years! I know they do not like to be in pots for too long, but I tend to keep them there so that I can put them in my unheated greenhouse over the winter for the first couple of years. Otherwise we lose the young plants in the cold/wet.

[Lesley Cox]

Hello Carolyn,
I don't feed with any regularity but when I plant them out (usually from 4" pots or planter bags) I include a good handful per plant in the planting hole, potassium sulphate which is tomato fertilizer to all intents and purposes anyway and I dig in compost at the same time. I usually find that the first really good flowering is in the second year after that. This year I'm using the pot sulph but in a fine, almost powdery form which I hope will act quicker if I water it in. The larger granular type seems to take a long time to melt down, although a bag of it left on my bench gathered water into itself very quickly and became impossible to handle. I'm using that by the tbspful, letting it dissolve in 10 litres of water in a can and watering it on irises in general until it's finished. It's also important with PCs to move or divide them when they have new white roots showing if you tease away the soil from round the base of the plant.

The seedlings from named forms and all others vary hugely. Hardly any two are the same. I have a lovely pinky-cream heavily veined with crimson and hoped for the same or similar from the seedlings but there were purples and golds and all sorts. Perhaps this was because I have quite a lot in a small area and the bees were busy too.

[fermi de Sousa]

Michael, you have an amazing group of PC seedlings!

They don't call him "Mr Amazing" for nothing!
Great flowers, Michael,
cheers
fermi

[GordonT]

Lesley, Thanks for the encouragement... I've had a membership with SPCNI for several years now You are right about the seed exchange. Since there are NO local suppliers of Pacific Coast Iris in Nova Scotia, I am doing my small bit to fill the gap, growing seed from the exchange, and testing plants in our gardens. I am trusting that a few more seedlings will show their colours this year.. To date I've managed to coax about five seedlings, from varied backgrounds to bloom, and have at least that many more in the garden. I did discover that southwestern Nova Scotian winters are simply too difficult for Iris munzii to survive, but others (likely with more tenax, douglasiana, chrysophylla bloodlines) seem to thrive, though they look like hell in early spring. My tactics in testing plants here has been to offer them no extra winter protection. Plants that survive this rough treatment will be more likely to survive similar treatment in the gardens of neophyte growers. One plant I hope to see bloom this year are two seedlings of Iris 'Line Drawing'.

[WimB]

Iris sibirica 'Flight of the Butterflies'
Iris tingitana var. fontanesii
and three more Pacific Coast seedlings.

[Lesley Cox]

Lovely irises Wim. I have some seedlings of a superb white sibirica, called 'Flight of Swans.' (No, it is called 'Swans in Flight.') They won't flower true of course but may be very good all the same. The parent is magnificent! A lot of PCs are germinating at present and I'll be very busy in the spring and summer potting up or planting out. I look around my hundreds of seed pots and almost despair at the work to be done. So why do I go on sowing seed? I suppose because I'm not ready to die yet. When one happens the other will follow soon after.

[WimB]

Lovely irises Wim. I have some seedlings of a superb white sibirica, called 'Flight of Swans.' (No, it is called 'Swans in Flight.') They won't flower true of course but may be very good all the same. The parent is magnificent! A lot of PCs are germinating at present and I'll be very busy in the spring and summer potting up or planting out. I look around my hundreds of seed pots and almost despair at the work to be done. So why do I go on sowing seed? I suppose because I'm not ready to die yet. When one happens the other will follow soon after.

Just had a look for 'Swans in Flight' and that's one big sibirica (I thought it was a bearded Iris on first sight).

My favourite sibirica was in flower today: Iris sibirica 'Snow Prince'

Also in flower: Iris sibirica 'Wealden Carousel' and Iris tectorum 'Album'

[johnralphcarpenter]

Iris xiphium, from Oron Peri. Sadly, the flower was snapped off in a storm yesterday.

[ashley]

Iris ruthenica from the exchange (SRGC 64-2311)

[Robert]

Lesley, Thanks for the encouragement... I've had a membership with SPCNI for several years now You are right about the seed exchange. Since there are NO local suppliers of Pacific Coast Iris in Nova Scotia, I am doing my small bit to fill the gap, growing seed from the exchange, and testing plants in our gardens. I am trusting that a few more seedlings will show their colours this year.. To date I've managed to coax about five seedlings, from varied backgrounds to bloom, and have at least that many more in the garden. I did discover that southwestern Nova Scotian winters are simply too difficult for Iris munzii to survive, but others (likely with more tenax, douglasiana, chrysophylla bloodlines) seem to thrive, though they look like hell in early spring. My tactics in testing plants here has been to offer them no extra winter protection. Plants that survive this rough treatment will be more likely to survive similar treatment in the gardens of neophyte growers. One plant I hope to see bloom this year are two seedlings of Iris 'Line Drawing'.

Gordon,

I finally had a chance to get another look at this thread. It is such a shame that many California species get stigmatized as not being cold hardy. I see plenty of Iris hartwegii growing at 5,000 feet, 1,524 meters, in the Sierra Nevada. At this elevation, winters are plenty cold and there can be plenty of snow during the winter or none. The geologic history of California seems to be forgotten. In a geologic sense, the last Ice Age was not that long ago. Although the genes are constantly shifting and plants certainly moved around as the ice came and went, the genetic potential for a greater degree of cold hardiness must certainly remain, if only as a recessive(s) (s = i.e. some sort of poly gene arrangement) or maybe a detrimental that is not detrimental under different conditions. Some California species have a tremendous range. I occasionally, find species growing beyond there normal altitude range. I hope to get down to the southern Sierra Nevada where Iris munzii is found. My guess is that Iris munzii might be found at higher elevations in this region. I have found this to be true with other species - it just takes a lot of effort and a bit of intuition.

Good luck with PCI. Hopefully you will be seeing blooming plants soon.

[johnralphcarpenter]

Iris hookeri.

[Lesley Cox]

Iris hookeri should most likely be named as I. setosa ssp. hookeri.

You have a really nice deep coloured form of I. ruthenica Ashley. There is an incredibly beautiful white form shown of Facebook a while back by a Russian gentleman called Andrey Dedov. He kindly gave me permission to use his photo in the NZIS Bulletin in an article I was writing so I'll take his permmission for granted again and post it here too. He has also shown a collection of flowers with an amazing varieties of blues purples and whites and combinations of them all.

[ashley]

Thanks Lesley.  Yes I like the inky blue too, but that white form is superb.

[johnralphcarpenter]

Iris 'Holden Clough'.