re: early bloom, disadvantages to late bloom
- To: Multiple recipients of list <i*@rt66.com>
- Subject: re: early bloom, disadvantages to late bloom
- From: L*@aol.com
- Date: Sun, 16 Mar 1997 06:27:08 -0700 (MST)
In a message dated 97-03-15 12:29:57 EST, you write:
>Perhaps we should be looking for cultivars that are slow to break
>dormancy--but it is so exciting to have early flowers!
>Dorothy Fingerhood
I wouldn't know : < . Phooey. 20o this morning. At least it is a clear
sunny day and things should warm up fairly quickly. There will be a few
'smart' ones out there, like VICTORIA FALLS, who bloom either early or late,
depending on the weather. ICE SCULPTURE is rotting like crazy this year - so
much for it's usual toughness. I moved it from a bed where it was buried in
sweet william thinking it might do better (it would only send up an
occasional bloom), but now I suspect it was getting some cold protection and
delayed initiation of tender growth from all the stuff piled on top of the
rhizomes and was just a bit more resistent to rot from wet and lack of air
than some.
Re: late bloom
Several hybridizers in region 7 have said that they have very poor success
hybridizing late bloomers because of the hot, dry, windy weather we often
have by that time of the season. They say the blooms turn to mush and no
pods.
When I talk about late bloomers being the only ones that bloom here
regularly, I don't mean the really late ones, but just the 'later' ones, like
DUSKY CHALLENGER, WORLD CLASS, ORANGE SLICES, ORBITER, FIESTA SONG, VANITY,
to name a few. Someone had mentioned that late bloomers bloom too late to be
elligible for widespread evaluation by judges who mostly see them during the
show season. We have had lots of 'ML' and 'L' iris at our display shows each
year. Is there a bigger 'spread' of bloom season in other regions? Our peak
bloom lasts about 2 weeks, so a late bloomer will be open about 2 weeks after
an early bloomer. A show in the middle usually catches some of all, given
microclimate differences among and within club members' gardens.
Linda Mann lmann76543@aol.com east Tennessee USA
enjoying big indoor bouquets of forsythia, tulips, peach blossoms,
'flowering' almond, and late daffodils.
