I like iris flowers just fine, although we have too many plants and not enough different varieties.
Iris Blooming May 28, 2015
What I don’t like is how the plants look when they finish blooming.
Sickly Iris in Prime Spot
Ugh. Several plants were especially bad, with brown leaves and spots and soft rhizomes.
Iris In Trouble July 1, 2015
I remembered iris get diseases and pests and found this excellent page by Shreiner’s Iris Garden about caring for iris and how to diagnose and treat the common problems.
My iris have the Iris Borer, a disgusting, icky pink caterpillar thing that starts as a tiny pest that chews its way down the leaves into the rhizome. (Can you tell I really don’t like these critters?)
They leave a footprint, a trail of dying tissue.
Iris Borer Footprints July 1, 2015
Per Schreiner you treat them by cutting off the dead and/or diseased parts and scraping out the soft gooey parts of the rhizomes. I tried this and found it was best to just cut off the dead, yucky parts and not try to save the partial rhizomes. We have a LOT of iris, about 5 times what I really want, so I was OK with losing a few.
This is one that got tossed.
Mucky Iris Rhizome July 1, 2015
It took a couple hours to handle two clumps. Each iris had to be separated, the individual rhizomes checked, icky stuff cut off, then replanted. One clump was OK, no borers. The other was full of the disgusting critters. I’m not going to put a photograph here since this is a family-friendly site.
I still have a lot of iris to check. Even the ones that are healthy need to be divided every couple of years, and they have been thriving here for three years, past time to divide. The problem is that dividing makes even more iris. They are gorgeous in bloom but I don’t want my whole garden to be iris and I hate just tossing the excess.
Anyone want some iris? If you live nearby c’mon over and get a bunch.
Red Peony Next to Yellow Iris June 2015
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