CULT: % of losses


In recent years, most tall bearded iris I have planted survive long enough to
make it through the folowing bloom season.  All but one of the ones I have
bought through local sales have lived. For enlightenment of those who try to
grow tall bearded irises in rot-prone areas, I dredged up my old garden maps
(dating back to more than 20 yrs ago) and present a history of finding
survivors:

One of my oldest trial beds orginally had 11 varieties.  Eight of them died
before blooming, and one that was doing really well died when I moved it to a
more highly drained gravelly site in a flower bed closer to the house.  I
quit tending the bed after they died, but the remaining two are still alive
out among the weeds - Lloyd Zurbrigg's PERFUME COUNTER, which blooms every
year, frozen or not, and WHITE DUET, which has bloomed once in more than 20
years.  The supplier was in New Mexico or Arizona and had a huge selection of
older inexpensive irises - not a good choice of supplier for my climate.

Another old trial bed had 8 varieties and all but one of them are still
alive.  The supplier was a giant operation in Missouri.  At the time, I
thought it was the source, but now that I know more, I see that they only
carried varieties proven to do well throughout the country (included things
like TUXEDO, BABBLING BROOK, GINGERBREAD CASTLE, RONDETTA).

The next bed had 10 varieties from another source in Missouri.  Two of those
bloom reliably (HOLIDAY HOUSE, SUNSET SKY), one or two others survived as
tiny non-blooming rhizomes, RONDETTA (again) managed to die after I abandoned
the bed..

Then I bought another 12 from the big MO outfit again and from one of those
slick mail order general nursery suppliers and lost very few plants.   The
lesson I learned from all this is that a small selection offered by a big
supplier is probably 'safer' than ordering from a supplier who offers the
kitchen sink.  However, most of these varieties do not bloom or increase very
much grown as perennial bed components.

Then I started buying from Schreiner's every year and from other places as I
got better at picking survivors.  I will have to look at my data base to
figure out short and long term survival there.

Linda Mann lmann76543@aol.com east Tennessee USA
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