Re: spring cleaning & rot

Linda writes

:lowell - just remember, what's true in colorado ain't neccessarily true in
:tennessee.  in regions with high humidity and rainfall, there are definitely
:differences in rot sensitivity amongst varieties.

I won't deny your experience in this area - we westerners have it pretty
easy when it comes to problems caused by moisture and humidity - but as
someone with scientific training, I find I'm very sensitized to the
human predilection to quickly build patterns out of random incidents. This
is a very common phenomenon; even the most meticulously objective personalities
are caught up by it from time to time. Therefore I share Lowell's caution
in attributing disease to the cultivar, hybridizer, or region of origin.

Of course it makes sense that irises bred and selected in the rot zone
are less likely to be susceptible to this disease. However, we must also
recognize that there is a predisposition to expect rot in "those big,
fat, California-bred irises", and human beings are amazingly prone to see
what they expect to see. Also, I have observed a most intense inclination
in iris growers to attribute *everything* that happens to a plant to which
cultivar it happens to be. (There are people, for example, who plant one
cultivar and get four increases, then plant another hundreds of yards
away in different soil, light, and water conditions, and get five increases;
they then proceed to tell the world how Brand X is such a better grower than
Brand Y.)

Yes, I know the list will now be flooded with stories of cultivars that
can't seem to help but rot time and time again. Pending scientific study,
we *do* need to note such apparent patterns, but at the same time we have
to be carefull not to read in more than may really be there.

FWIW


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Tom Tadfor Little         tlittle@lanl.gov  -or-  telp@Rt66.com
technical writer/editor   Los Alamos National Laboratory
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Telperion Productions     http://www.rt66.com/~telp/
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