CULT: cretensis, attica, and wattii revisited

From:	dkramb@tso.cin.ix.net (Dennis Kramb)

I need some help!  Please respond to each problem individually, if you can.
Thanks!!

WATTII - I acquired some starts of Iris wattii last year from a woman in
California.  I've been growing them in 25 qt. pots indoors and they've done
just fine in the 9 months or so that I've had them, increasing like mad.  A
bloom stalk started to form on the oldest fan, it grew a few inches, and
then stopped.  After 3 weeks it is now turning brown, but the fan and all
the other increases are perfectly healthy.  What would cause this?  How to
I avoid it happening again?

ATTICA - I brought some Iris attica back with me from Greece in September.
They were just breaking dormancy as the autumn rains were returning to
Athens.  I kept them indoors during the coldest weeks of the winter, and
outdoors during the warmer spells.  I know that these require fast draining
soil and bright sunlight, but I can't provide bright sun indoors.  At any
rate, one flower bloomed for me during Christmas, but now all the plants
appear to be going dormant again.  They should not be going dormant until
June!  The rhizomes are firm, and there appear to be no signs of disease
(except for aphids).  What might be happening here???  They were supposed
to go into full bloom in April.

CRETENSIS - I got these from Greece as well.  They're doing fine and dandy.
One of them flowered a couple weeks ago and I pollenated it (selfed it)
but much to my amazement it didn't take.  The flower was freshly opened, so
the stigmatic lip ought to have been receptive, and the anthers were loaded
with pollen.  What did I do wrong?  This is some urgency here as more
flowers are coming up and I really want to get some seeds.  These are
supposedly a form of UNGUICULARIS, so if you have experiencing selfing
UNGUICULARIS then the same techniques ought to work for CRETENSIS.  If 2
flowers are open at once, would it be better to cross them?  I think
they're all the same clone (I'll know when they open).

Dennis Kramb; dkramb@tso.cin.ix.net
Cincinnati, Ohio USA; USDA Zone 6; AIS Region 6
Member of AIS, ASI, HIPS, SIGNA, SLI, & Miami Valley Iris Society
Primary Interests: ABs, REBs, LAs, Native Ohio SPEC and SPEC-X hybrids
(Check out my web page at http://home.fuse.net/dkramb/home.html)



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