Re: IRIS-L digest 622


Rima asked -->

Interesting that it may be the rain and cold.  The irises here with all
the holes in the leaves are on a bank that drains well and the clumps
right next to them are fine.
What do you fertilize the beardless with?  How do you know it's time to
fertilize?
Rima  terra@catskill.net
upstate ny  zone 4  70 degrees today and there are gorjus bloomstalks on
the pseuds and TBs -- 0 on the SIBS

**
---> I think my holes are slugs and resulting damage from rust and such like.

---------> fertilizing the TB's is done here when they are finished blooming,
and I dig around the roots to encourage growth for next year. When I'm 
digging even more to separate for our Sale, I'll fertilize after all of that.

I use 5 - 10 - 5.

And last year I started to use alfalfa pellets early in the growing season.
I put a handful (well, actually, I just took the bucket and spread a layer
all along the rows) and left them on the top of the soil. It was rainy 
last spring, too, so I think they leached into the soil and broke down
over the summer.  This seems to have given me great foliage on most of
them and I've lots of bloomstalks.

When I put cygon on in early April, in two sessions 7 to 10 days apart, I
put some Miracle-Gro in the sprayer, about a tablespoon to 1.5 gallons.
this gets sprayed on the foliage and soil around the plants. (this is the
only area of the garden that gets pesticides, the worms etc, are happy 
enough after a few weeks. There are lots of them when I'm digging, so
I'm wondering if they don't escape, reproduce, or are not affected.
Ladybugs and other bennies abound in the rest of the estate, so I don't
eradicate them,either.

The WNYIris Society's big show is the 14th -- I have bloomstalks up tall
and straight (waiting for that escaped borer to eat the "queen of show" 
sitting there) and they are in a holding mode.  It's cold today, and rained
yesterday, so, the Iris goddess is at work.

Dorothy Fingerhood --> are you going to bring some samples??

Carolyn Schaffner in Buffalo, NY
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