Re: CULT: replanting every year

>   V. sez:
>   I think this depends on your zone. I am zone 6. I see
> higher % bloom on established clumps than on first year
> plants. First year plants generally have about a 66% chance
> of blooming the first year here, regardless of where the
> rhizomes came from or how short a time they were out of the
> ground. Bad weather can reduce this percentage. Bud count
> and stalk height generally increases on established clumps
> also.
>   There is a commercial garden in PA that replants every
> rhizome each year - this is to maximize increase, in part
> by reducing the bloom the following year. Spring bloom in
> their commercial beds is pitiful - but if you order from
> them, you will get large rhizomes.
> 

This would definitely depend on your zone.  I'm somewhere around Zone 8 as
far as I can work out, which is milder than a lot (if not most) of the
other growers out there on this list I'd hazard.  No zone was mentioned in
the original email, but rather a blanket "most varieties" which is why I
wanted to refute it a little.  it isn't worth scaring people off when in
their area it may not be the case.

I've found that around 50% of the irises I buy in a year will flower the
following spring.  Sometimes way better, other times way worse.  Depends on
the climate etc.  But certainly I don't feel that most of them have been
hurt by being moved.  These are plants that have been bud up, packaged and
sent, so there's pretty catastrophic root disturbance.  When replanting
your own I find that there really is not difference HERE in flowering to
what I would have expected without dividing.  I just wanted to emphasise that.

All of this conversation comes down to your own area/microclimates.  I
would assume the harsher the climate the more difficulty the iris has in
re-establishing it's root system.

I'm just glad they're so hardy.  I haven't had them out of the ground 18
months and replanted them, but I've had them in storage for 15 months and
had them grow.

Cheers.

Paul Tyerman
Canberra, Australia.  USDA equivalent - Zone 8
p*@ozemail.com.au

Growing.... Galanthus, Erythroniums, Fritillarias, Crocus, Cyrtanthus,
Liliums, Hellebores, Aroids, Irises plus just about anything else that
doesn't move!!!!!


 

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