SPEC: I. verna: Forms, Clones, and a Hybrid!
- Subject: SPEC: I. verna: Forms, Clones, and a Hybrid!
- From: H*@aol.com
- Date: Tue, 16 Mar 1999 21:08:06 EST
From: HIPSource@aol.com
In a message dated 3/16/99 6:42:55 PM Eastern Standard Time,
dkramb@tso.cin.ix.net writes:
<< One of the reasons I wanted to go to West Virginia was (a) it's not too
far
from Cincinnati, and (b) according to Fritz Kohlein's book, there is a form
of Iris verna there that is possibly an undescribed species. Not that I
could distinguish the difference, but hey, I'll never know unless I try! >>
Remembering that Kohlein is an older book and not without flaws, some of which
can be attributed to the translation, I dug out the more recent BIS species
book to see what it might have to say useful about this alternate form. Nada
that I could tell, unless he means I. verna. var smalliana. WOI says nothing
useful on the point of the Appalachian form, either. Maybe someone will have
more useful info.
There are nice pictures of this little native iris on Rodney Barton's page.
Celia took them. http://molly.hsc.unt.edu/~rbarton/Iris/I_verna.html
And folks interested in I.verna most especially will want to get hold of the
Fall 1995 issue of SIGNA, which is the journal of the Species Iris Group of
North America, also known as SIGNA. This issue has several articles on the
subject including one which reveals that in the 'forties Fairmont Gardens
offerred several differently colored named clones, all collected plants.
One thing I noticed in the BIS book that I did not know before--or if I did
I've forgotten--is that there was/is a successful cross of I. verna with I.
pallida. Ran right over and got out the Randolph book, Garden Irises, the AIS
book that preceded WOI, and on page 435 is found the following:
"The only recorded hybrid of this species is J. R. McLeland's cross of I.
pallida with I.verna. One seedling was named Pal-verna. Several
characteristics of the McLeland hybrids indicate that the cross was
authentic."
Mercifully, the pallida was the mom.
Anner Whitehead
HIPSource@aol.com
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