Re: A timid hello to everybody (and an embarassing question)

At 05:21 PM 4/9/96 MDT, you wrote:
snip...
>
>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.
>
>-- Steve LaMantia
>   Seattle, WA

Hello, Steve: 


Welcome to the list! There is no such thing as a dumb question and I have
had the same thing happen to me. The Dutch Iris bloom best with a long dry
period in the summer. If you watered them in the planter, that could be what
"confused" them.

They also do not especially like rich soil, but do need some drainage, as
the ones on the hillside probably have. If you used commercial soil mix in
the planter, it might be too rich with organic matter. They will also quit
blooming if the offset bulbs they form get too crowded, as is the case with
Lilies, but this is not as likely since you just moved them. 

Some of them might recover and bloom later on. I once ditched some that I
thought had given up in a wilder area of my yard and they bloomed like crazy
the next year. There is also the possibility that they have gotten rot from
all the pounding rains that we have had here in the great green Northwest.
They do flourish in the full sun and need a long dry summer. Too much water
can cause the leaves to yellow. What to do now?

Well, you can lift one that is yellowing and look for signs of rot- the bulb
will be yucky- soft and brown or yellow and spotty instead of the normal
white and firm. If so. the best course is to ditch them and try again. Or
you can leave them alone and see if they just taking a vacation. They are
not long-lived the way daffodils and some other bulbs are, so you might have
gotten some that were "going west" anyway.

As you can probably guess, I am a Dutch Iris fan. They make great cut
flowers and fill a bloom gap for me. They are fantastik in a bouquet with
Asiatic Lilies.
 
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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