Re: Re: CULT: Iris companion plants

I hope, in my clumsy way, I have not made it seem that I am disparaging what I term collections. Well tended rows of an Iris collection require a good deal of work and as a devotee of the plant I appreciate how they show off individual varieties. But I have also tried to have what I call a garden and it requires an enormous amount of thought and work, much more so than my collections. When successful it is a work of art in itself. Perhaps some would call this landscaping with Iris. Unfortunately every site is unique and has its own peculiar microclimates so I am not sure one can ever copy exactly the successes seen in other gardens in ones own. Certainly the Iris beds at Shreiners are a wonder with alpine poppies, Lupines, Peonies, etc. and etc. But Alpine poppies wont grow in my climate and neither do the lupines without a great deal of pampering. When people outside of Iris specialists talk about gardens I think they have something different in mind than the collections we tend. I
 also think that Iris sometimes have a poor reputation among gardeners because we enthusiasts often separate them out from our gardens and they seem too often relegated to a corn row type collection. I worry that by treating them so preferentially we are developing races of pampered plants that can not perform in a perennial border. The Iris of my grandmother seemed to have little difficulty holding there own among phlox and poppies, daisies and columbine, and many other often pugnacious plants. Of course I will often do most anything to get a certain special Iris to grow, but as I get older I am less inclined to baby the bulk of my plants. When I first started gardening I was a student of William Robinson, who was also a mentor to Gertrude Jekyll. I discovered making a naturalistic garden can be more work than any other form. I still treasure the little edens one might create, but to grow the number of plants I want I still occasionally fall back to creating corn rows.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE IRIS
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index