Re: Scaring the livin daylights


On Fri, 30 Aug 1996    Sally Guye wrote:

>I read with interest and apprehension Mike Lowe's excellent advice on 
>Same Soil blues.  But it is a very small yard we are talking here. 
>One is hard put to know where the new ones ordered can be planted let 
>alone find any virgin soil.  The policy in the past was as a clump 
>got big,  we divided and replanted some in a new area but there is a 
>limit.  I was viewing with distaste  the amount of paving and then 
>remembered someone mentioned tubs.  Can one grow 
>Beardeds in tubs -  how deep and how wide should they be?  Any advice 
>thankfully received.  
>
>Sally in South Africa  - lovely spring day but beastly Berg Wind


I do not know what to make of Mike Lowe's advice.  I have been growing 
TBs in the same 2 small beds for about 10 years.  I just work compost and 
sometimes other soil ammendments in each time I lift and divide them.  
As far as I can tell they are just fine - they grow and they flower.   I 
am 
not recommending this.  I am only saying this is what I have done.  
I have grown TBs in tubs (half barrels) since 1991.  How well they do 
depends on how concientious I am about watering them.  They do need to 
be dug up and divided more often than those planted in the ground.  I also 
grow Iris pallida in a tub and it does best if it is dug up and divided 
every 
year.  The tubs are large - half of a whiskey or wine barrel.  I don't 
really 
have a specific soil mix - just compost and whatever else is at hand that 
seems good to me (sand, decomposed granite, old potting soil, etc.).  

I also grow Dutch iris, aril iris, and species in pots.  The soil mix that 
I use 
for these is  4 parts Supersoil, 1 part perlite, 0.5 part washed builder's 
sand.  To explain:  Supersoil is a comercial potting mix only sold in the 
western US (as far as I know) which is made of composted bark and some 
sand.  Perlite is a mineral that is processed somehow to make it expand; 
it 
is light and promotes drainage.    This mix seems to work well under _my 
growing conditions_.  

Lucinda Ebert                e-mail:  tebert@sunstroke.sdsu.edu
Poway, CA
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