Iris Growing Tip!

Here is a tip for those people whose irises that get heaved out of the 
ground by the frost action. I don't know about the other people that 
grow iris but my 
iris ALWAYS get heaved out of the ground the first winter/spring after 
planting!! It doesn't seem to make any difference whether I plant 
early (end July) or later (end August-September). They just like to rise 
up out of the ground. I was checking today and some rhizomes are almost 
one inch (2.54 cm) above ground standing on their roots like stilts. If 
you live in a colder zone I'm sure you can relate to this!

Now, you can just push them down again if the ground is unfrozen deep enough 
but it usually isn't. A lot of times they just jump back up too. Also there 
is a danger to the plant of breaking off the existing root system. 

What I do for this problem is get a bag or two of sand and pour 
it around the plants to almost cover the rhizomes and protect them from 
the last ravages of winter. The sand also provides good drainage as the TB 
iris like and it also helps my predominently clay soil structure. I've 
done this for the last 3-4 years and it seems to work well. 
Anyway, I just thought that I would share this particular "growing tip" with 
everyone. 
What do the rest of you do for this special iris trait??

PS I have to keep my bags of sand in the basement so that they don't 
freeze solid.   

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Chris Hollinshead e-mail: bu336@torfree.net
Mississauga, Ontario Canada
zone 6b, raining today and a balmy 33 degrees F.
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