Re: Species Iris - I. cycloglossa

Donald Mosser asks:
>I'm assuming that I. cylcoglossa can take some frost since it is bulbous.
>However, can it take the heat and humidity that is indicative of
>southeastern U.S. Summers (approximately 100 degrees Far.)?

It's actually a native of northwest Afghanistan, which should be a pretty
continental climate, so I should imagine that it has a much wider tolerance
of temperarure extremes than anything I have ever subjected it to.
Concerning the summer humidity, all I can say is that British summers are
notoriously unpredictable, veering from Mediterranean-dry to monsoon-wet,
and this is what often (reputedly) is what causes most of the problems for
people who try to grow the more difficult junos in the garden.  I say
"reputedly" as I have no experience myself of other than the easier ones
(e.g. bucharica) outside.

>I'll try looking for this in some of my bulb catalogs.  Anyone on the list
>have a source for this one?

If there is no source easily to hand in N. America, you could try Paul
Christian's nursery in Wales.  He has listed I. cycloglossa for some years -
he also exports & will accept credit cards.  He has a web page at
http://www.rareplants.co.uk
but sadly hasn't put his wide range of irises up yet - you can however
e-mail him from the web page.

BTW, I should also add that this plant comes easily from seed, should you
get the chance.  The flower illustrated on Tom's corkboard is from one of a
group of plants I grew from seed that was taken from plants of the original
Wendelbo Hedge & Ekberg collection.  There is a little variability in the
population, mostly in the floppiness of the falls, but the colour seems very
stable (in my group of plants at least).  Each plant can produce multiple
blooms, widely spaced up the stem.

I hope some if this might be useful, and tempt some of you at least to try
this plant.

Ian

*******************************
Ian Black  ianblack@easynet.co.uk
Hampshire, UK  - mintemp  -8C
http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~ianblack/
*******************************
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