Re: RE: Borers - My personal observations

Laetitia wrote: "As for borer preferring large
rhizomes, I am sure they do, but I don't think they
have the brains to go house-hunting, so to speak. I
have had whole clumps of pardancanda (an irid with
very small rhizomes) totally devastated by borer. They
probably eat them like you would eat a bag of popcorn.
When ready to pupate I think they can travel distances
too. I have found pupa in areas 10 feet away from the
nearest iris rhizome. I also think they prefer non pbf
iris, as they are less frequently attacked. At Presby
I have seen whole rows of pbf iris spared and the next
row full of borer..so they definitely have their
preferences."

First of all, congratulations on going from 150+ to
around 8 borers. Sounds like Imidacloprid is the
weapon of choice -- although I'm still going to try to
get by without it. Secondly, those are very
interesting observations. I've seen moderate borer
damage on some small rhizome types also. It's made me
wonder if rhizome size really is the factor that's
sparing many of those MTB's. Maybe it's something
else, in addition to size. I wonder how the moths find
the irises (to lay their eggs near), by sight, scent
or both. I'll have to pay attention to my strong-PBF
and non-PBF siblings to see if I can tell any
difference in attack rates. Thanks for sharing your
observations, Laetitia.

And "Good Luck", Annette. I hope the temperature
moderates and we get a ground-softening rain soon so
you can get your irises in the ground (and then some
more rain would be really nice). I've got the same
problem here (in Maryland), with dug iris seedlings
sitting in a cardboard box and some purchased irises
on the way. It's soooo hot and humid, and the ground
is soooo dry, that I don't even want to think about
going out there to plant. Good thing irises are so
forgiving.

Take care all, Tom
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