----- Original Message -----

From: c*@impressiveirises.com.au

To: iris-photos@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Tuesday, April 20, 2010 6:45 PM

Subject: Re: [iris-photos] Re: [iris] Re: Help: Rhizome/stalk question

Hi El

I didn't need to see this story this morning. We posted our export orders last Thursday. The ones for the USA arrived in LAX in a couple of days. Unfortunately all the European flights from Australia were cancelled the next day. Our order for Poland???? it's somewhere between Adelaide, Aust and Poland and who knows when it will be delivered, given the backlog of mail there will be. We sent it Express so I hope it does get priority.
The thought of smelly rhizomes conjures up bad images.

Colleen Modra
Adelaide Hills Aust.

El Hutchison wrote:

 

Linda, back at the end of August 2007, I rec'd about 50 iris that had been greatly traumatized by being left in Customs for over 3 weeks.  Needless to say, we have since changed our methods of ordering outside Canada, with much better success.

 

Optimally, I like to receive new iris around the end of July, to give them time to settle in before our harsh winters.

 

I could smell the iris before I even opened the box.  I gloved up, and gingerly opened the box to find a mostly slimey mass of foliage and rhizomes.  I carefully unpacked the box, and left the iris to dry a bit in the sun while I prepared several containers of 10% bleach solution.  Not all of the rhizomes were hard, but I treated them all anyway, and left them again to dry in the sun.  As their names were written on the foliage, I was unable to read most of them.

 

When I was about to plant them all the next morning, I noticed my container of perennial Myke, so I gently dipped each rhizome in a bit of water, then into this product that has mycorrhizal fungi which is supposed to help root growth.

 

About half of them survived that first winter.  A few even bloomed last year, and I was able to id them.  I'm hoping more will bloom this year.

 

Now, I haven't tried any further experiments w the myke product on irises, but perhaps I should.

 

Plus, for about the last 10 years, I've swished every new iris, no matter where it comes from, in 10% bleach sol'n.

 

El, near Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada Z3