A timid hello to everybody (and an embarassing question)

Hi, everybody.  I just discovered this mailing list, and thought I'd jump
right in with a question.  (I hope that's not being *too* forward.)  I
noticed that a bio is required for this group, so here's a bit about
myself first.

Actually, there's not much to say. I would guess that I'm probably the
least experienced and knowledgeable person to ever grace this list in the
history of time.  (Regarding irises, I mean, although maybe in general,
too. ;-)  I've been gardening about five years now, mostly veggies -- nice
long growing season here in Seattle, but cool -- but two springs ago my
wife (who also does veggies, but also is Mom to three dozen rose bushes,
and who I'm going to be trying to talk into subscribing to this list, too)
bought five yellow Dutch irises, and they grew well and we were really
struck with their beauty.  Then, as luck would have it, we discovered
growing wild on the back hill a dozen or so irises that looked exactly
like out yellow Dutch irises, only they were purple and yellow.  (We
figure a previous owner of the house had planted some up there years ago,
and they had naturalized.)  After the "wild" irises bloomed last year, we
dug up the bulbs, and planted them in a planter on the deck last summer,
and ever since then we've been excited about them and have been reading up
on irises in general, trying to learn more about them.

So, that's about it for the bio.  Nothing spectacular, and I'm almost a
little embarassed by my "novice-hood" in the midst of experts, but what
the heck, I've been embarassed worse. :-)  So you all have my permission
to laugh out loud at any and all dumb questions I may ask; I'll consider
it my "price of admission."  :-)

And now for my specific question.  Those yellow and purple irises we dug
from the hill and replanted seem to have gotten "out of synch" somehow. We
dug them up, as I recall, about three weeks after they bloomed, probably
around late May or early June.  They sat wrapped in newspaper for a few
weeks, and then around early July or so, we planted them in the wooden
planter on the deck, and figured we'd be seeing them again come Christmas
or so (when the purchased yellow Dutch irised had first appeared the year
before). However, to our incredible surprise and total confusion, they
started growing up from the soil around late August or so, only a few
months after we moved the bulbs, and by Christmas they were already about
a foot tall.  Now in April, they're over a foot and a half, and we were
all excited lately, figuring in a month or so they'd start showing
flowers.

But in the last few weeks, they leaves have started looking a bit yellow,
almost as if they think they've already bloomed and are starting to think
about dying back.

So now the wife and I are totally befuddled about what's going on with
these guys.  Our experience is mostly with vegetables (and there, mostly
annuals), and with the roses (which are perennials, of course, but don't
use the "bulb method" of propogating), so our whole awareness of the
performance and needs of plants that work from bulbs is pretty slim.  Did
we mess up their "clock" somehow, by digging them up last year too soon
after they bloomed?  Or is it something else?  Anyone have any ideas?
We'd sure be grateful.

[And again, hello to everybody.  I'm really glad to have found this list,
and look forward to reading about all the different types of irises and
how to care for them, and hope to learn a lot from everyone, and to have
a bit more luck with future batches of irises than we're having with the
ones we "captured" from the wild.  Thanks.]

-- Steve LaMantia
   Seattle, WA
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index