Re: CULT: summer iris observations

From: "Donald Eaves" <donald@eastland.net>

Hello Folks,

Here in my part of Texas, the heat and dry weather (it only takes a
day or two of our dry heat to bake the surface) are taking the usual
toll on the iris fans.  Nearly everything has brown tips in spite of a
Fort Knox ration of water.

IDIDIT, LEMON CHESS and VOLTAGE are the only cultivars which
seem unscathed.  All, and especially IDIDIT, look healthy and green
and relatively stress free.  But their neighbors..........

Also, last summer at the Fort Worth Iris sale I bought a cultivar as
BOSS TWEED which turned out to be a nice amoena.  The last of
the increases is now putting up a stalk.  I guess I'll see how it stands
up in July/August heat.  Maybe it won't do that great and then I won't
be so disappointed in the bloomout.

Otherwise, I picked up a pure aril last year and so far it is still 
showing some green.  Some of the arilbreds have gone dormant (I
hope it's dormancy and not death, anyway).  I was curious as to
how the aril would compare.  It actually has received a bit more water
than some of the arilbreds, but shows no sign of rot and is about in
the same stage of not growing as the majority of the arilbreds.

Only one more pod left to ripen and gather.  I thought my pollinating
results were pretty dismal when I was out daubing.  However, I am
rethinking that position.  The pods have had from two to sixty seeds
as the outer limits.  With thirteen pods, that ends up being a lot of
seeds.  Even if the percentage of survival is not all that high, it still
means a considerably amount of space will be needed to grow them
to maiden bloom.  A telling argument for making carefully planned
crosses and not fooling with anything else.  I have lots of space, but
the effort of digging out boulders and using the pickaxe in the clay
sure gives the old body pause for thought on the number of seeds
which might be agreeable to handle.  All but two of the pods were
from aril ancestry crosses,  so maybe the germination will be sparse?

Donald Eaves
donald@eastland.net
Texas Zone 7


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