Pacificas and color spoof

Iris tenax is blooming here and it is lovely.  Most of the ones I have are
from seed I collected from the darkest purple ones in upland areas. The rich
glowing purple is wonderful. They match the color of a Rododendron called R.
russatum BLACK VIOLET and some dark purple rockcress. It is fun to have a
few different species of flowers that are the same or adjacent colors
blooming together. 

If you like a spoof, plant black pansies at the feet of the blackest TB's
such as BLACKOUT and that newer orange pansy with the impossible name to
spell looks great with oranges such as ORANGE SLICES. Side by side, you can
have Halloween in May or June! There are "amoena" and "variegata" pansies as
well. If you can grow the hardier English Violets, they are available in
this full range of color and are more perennial here.  What great fun
shopping for the violets with my Iris catalogs in hand: the people at the
nursery thought that I was very badly confused!  Cooley's has been bordering
their display beds with pansies for years; I simple took the idea a step
further.

I have some especially tough crosses of douglasiana x ?tenax. With my lack
of experience who knows who introduced the pollen- me or the bees!  They
have the ice-blue douglasiana kind of color but are much shorter. In my
partially shaded rockery the rocks help to keep the soil cool in the summer.
Other than that, they get no special care. If ever I do some serious
hybridizing, my biggest goal would be to adapt these wonderful Iris to grow
in more widespread conditions.

I know a Lily grower who deliberately subjects his "youngsters" to the wet
and muggy conditions found in the East during the summer in order to produce
rot-resistant hybrids (yes, Lilies also get a kind of rot!).  I hope you
folks in other areas will be willing to continue to try and grow some
Pacificas from seed. Sooner or later we might get some that are better adapted.




Louise H. Parsons  <parsont@peak.org>
1915 SE Stone St.
Corvallis, OR 97333  USA
USDA zone 7 , Emerald NARGS, AIS, SIGNA, SPCNI, transplanted Oregrowian
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