Winter Kill?

The snow has just finally gone away in our area, I was out in the garden 
checking how it did over our long winter. Well, every iris received from 
Schreiners was lost; eight of them. CELEBRATION SONG, CASCADE SPRINGS, IN 
THE MOOD, PAINT IT BLACK, SAPPHIRE HILLS, CHAMPAGNE WALTZ, FEATURE 
ATTRACTION, CHANTEUSE. I'm really major league disappointed. All the 
rhizomes 
are completely soft and squishy all the way through. Now, once again, 
all of the rhizomes from elsewhere are a-okay. Why, why do I have this 
problem? Is it because the large rhizomes from Oregon have a very high 
moisture content compared to ones from areas such as my local climate? 
Symptoms are that they freeze up over the winter and when they defrost 
they turn into a sponge. 
The ground here is only just starting to unfreeze, only the top inch or so is 
unfrozen so far. I can tell that these iris are finished though. 
Sorry to be negative but this has happened for a couple of years now 
and I can never seem to find a rational explanation that isn't just heresay.
Can anyone help? I'm determined to find out what happened and I think 
that I will have one of the plants analyized for cause of death. Anyone 
got an e-mail address for Schreiners? 

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Chris Hollinshead e-mail: bu336@torfree.net
Mississauga, Ontario Canada
zone 6b
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