AIS:San Diego Trek

What a great weekend I've just had in San Diego.  The San Diego and 
Imperial Counties Iris Society invited me out for their annual Trek, 
and for the nominal cost of blathering on for an hour about iris 
(coals to Newcastle), I got a wonderful trip and the chance to visit 
some superb gardens, as well as an opportunity to meet a group of 
highly congenial and interesting people.

We bounced out early Saturday morning at 7 AM on two big buses for 
the garden tours.  Richard and Pam Richards and Walt and Pat Brendel 
were the engaging and efficient bus captains.  To my surprise, the 
immediate area of San Diego is cool and overcast most May and June 
mornings, and a sweater was needed.  Later in the day and further 
inland, temperatures warmed up and the brilliant Southern California 
sun was much in evidence--lucky I had thought to bring a hat!

Our first destination was El Cajon, and the garden of Roz and Ed 
Hill, a creekside paradise.  Most of us stocked up on breakfast 
goodies here, including oranges from the Hills' own trees.  At this 
elevation, most of the irises had gone by, but we did see some big 
clumps of unidentified historics in bloom.  Much debate over the 
identities of these beauties.  Visitors were bowled over by a superb 
rose garden here--roses as only Southern California can grow, but 
amazing even by those high standards.  And, in the back, a 
well-tended orchard of fruit trees that portended a fine harvest of 
apricots this year.

Then on to home of Paul and Debbie Potter, higher in the granitic, 
boulder-covered hills.  This garden was very much a work-in-progress, 
but already outstanding in many ways, including a newly installed 
pool designed by Debbie, from which a magnificent view of the hills 
can be had.  Here the irises were still near peak bloom, and we saw a 
goodly number of guests, as well as the Potters' own collection. 
Perhaps garnering the most attention was a stalk of SNOW SUMMIT 
(yellow amoena) I discovered near the front door, with six perfect 
open blooms and 24 buds by actual count!  In fact, the lowest branch 
on its own would have qualified as a good show stalk.  At one point I 
found a selection of Water Moores' introductions--unluckily none were 
blooming, and it looked as though these Mississippi natives were 
having some problems adapting to an arid hillside in Southern 
California.  So the adaptation problem might cut both ways, as Walter 
has frequently told us about his difficulties getting west coast 
rhizomes established (However, later, at the Rochas' garden, we saw a 
superb clump of ASCII ART, so it may be just a matter of time).  The 
Potters were also growing some very nice Louisianas in their own 
home-made swamp, atop a rocky desert hill.  EASTER TIDE, PROFESSOR 
IKE and COLORIFIC looked very much at home in this strange setting. 
Yet more refreshments here, including champagne (!) and delicious 
fresh fruit.

A long ride far back into the mountains brought us to the historic 
old mining town of Julian (famed for its apples--many of which seem 
to come from Washington state, if some folks on the bus had the story 
right). Bypassing Julian itself, we wound high into the mountains, 
probably to about 4000' elevation, to see the beautifully groomed and 
grown garden of Ken and Christie Pearson.  This is a couple with 
talents to spare, since Ken is a stained-glass artist and Christie 
created an extraordinarily complex quilt that was the centerpiece of 
the evening raffle.  Seeing the abundant bloom in this garden, it was 
hard to believe that little more than a week earlier it had been 
under a few inches of snow, and flurries had happened just four days 
ago.  Even so, we were told that the garden was only at about 1/3 
peak bloom.  But this gave us the chance to feast our eyes on SDBs, 
IBs and Arilbreds.  The keynote of this garden is superb culture. 
I've never seen tall bearded irises better grown--huge yet thrifty 
fans of foliage, with nary a touch of leaf spot or rot--and abundant 
bloom all 'round.  Ken and Christie have a "secret" fertilizer 
formulation, which they shared with several of us, and have promised 
to publish in the AIS Bulletin sometime soon.  It is based on a rose 
fertilizer originally compounded by a chemist/rose grower.  Whatever 
it is, it works.  We saw year 2000 crosses that were already in 
bloom, some with multiple stalks and many increases.  So believe Mike 
Sutton when he says they can get bloom the year following a cross 
being made--but I suspect even Mike would have goggled his eyes at 
these amazing plants.  And among them was a huge, ruffled 
pink-bearded pink that suggested Ken and Christie have a good eye for 
parents.  In a pot on the patio was a huge single bloom of PERSIAN 
PADISHA, and in beds on the hillside a nice selection of arilbreds. 
I spotted some huge cones from the surrounding Sugar Pines--sure 
wouldn't want to be under one of those when it falls.

They dragged us away from this mountaintop paradise to backtrack to 
Ramona for the garden created on a small valley lot by Steve and 
Sharlyn Rocha.  And again, perfect culture and exquisite attention to 
grooming had the crowd exclaiming.  Steve and Sharlyn have a more 
traditional planting, with rows and rows of tall beardeds, as well as 
a very big collection of MTBs, also in full bloom.  What a pleasure 
it was to be able to wander around and see and compare a large 
selection of these miniatures, and by checking introduction dates, 
trace the developments over the years.  Some of Steve's seedlings, 
including a blue plicata and some very striking quarter-bred arils 
out of the TB parent PERSIAN BERRY, looked very good.  There was also 
a good collection of Louisianas with outrageous numbers of tall 
stalks about to bloom--surprising was the compactness of the clumps; 
here in Virginia these things wander all about the garden on their 
long, yam-like rhizomes.  At this garden I first met an iris that all 
the San Diegans were talking about--as yet unintroduced, but 
registered by Pete DeSantis as SCOONCHEE.  Talk about a garden 
iris--this thing grows like a weed, and its well-formed, large violet 
flowers make a fine garden show.  Can't wait to try it in the east. 
Another DeSantis seedling, WHIPPERSNAPPER, won the Bernard Hamner 
Award for the best in-region seedling.

The banquet that evening was wonderful fun, with a lot of interesting 
door prizes and a raffle of really fine stuff--I had my eye (and 
about $25 worth of tickets) on a very fine Japanese print...but 
didn't get it.  And so it goes.  Some of my disappointment was made 
up for by a fantastic arrangement of spurias on the head table.  I 
believe it featured a Walt Brendel spuria seedling seen earlier in 
the day, and which, if introduced, is a real Nies Medal contender.

Well, those are my immediate impressions, and any of you who happen 
to be in the San Diego/Imperial County area for the trek in 
subsequent years should make every effort to do it. It's pure 
pleasure.
-- 

Bill Shear
Department of Biology
Hampden-Sydney College
Hampden-Sydney VA 23943
(804)223-6172
FAX (804)223-6374
email<wshear@email.hsc.edu>
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"The effect of a good government is to make life more valuable--of a 
bad government, to make it less valuable....Who can be serene in a 
country where both rulers and ruled are without principle?  The 
remembrance of the baseness of politicians spoils my walks.  My 
thoughts are murder to the State..."

--Henry David Thoreau, Journals, June 16, 1854 (on learning that an 
escaped slave, Anthony Burns, had been forcibly returned to his 
master by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts) . 

 

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