Re: Slow starters

> Laurie, you are a fellow Zone 3er...SIBS love our wintry weather
> so to lose a SIB would be rare. I think I lost one out of the
> hundreds I have grown. It was ERIC THE RED..an oldie but it
> arrived here half-dead and it never took hold. 

Hi Ellen,

Thanks for the reply, and funny you should mention ERIC THE RED.  ETR 
is the FIRST and ONLY Sib I grew for a number of years, and I abused 
that poor thing horribly!  In fact, the original small clump is still 
growing in a dry bed where it competes with tree roots and is 
completely overgrown with weeds and grass.  I don't think I could
kill 
it if I actually tried, and I certainly haven't done much to help it 
prosper.  

Last year I decided to do better and created a new Sib bed in a low 
drainage area in my yard that gets swamped after every rain but
drains 
off within a day or two.  I bought about a dozen new Sibs and planted 
them in it, along with a division of ETR, a setosa, and an I. 
chrysographes that has struggled to survive this climate for the last 
couple of years.  To my extraordinary amazement, even the 
chrysographes (which is not *supposed* to be hardy here) seems to
have 
survived this last exceptionally severe and prolonged winter with 
absolutely no protection other than minimal snow for the first frigid 
half and deeper snow for the second half. I checked again this 
morning, and I can now see the very tiniest of green beginnings on
ALL 
of the irises in that bed, including the three about which I 
originally started this thread.

I am just so pleased I can hardly stand myself!  LOL! Of course, I 
probably won't be seeing any bloom for another year or two as these 
were all single or double, bareroot rzs planted last summer.  Hey,
I'm 
just happy they all made it through Ma Nature's worst.

I guess I'll have to expand that bed and add more of these tough 
little buggers this year.

Laurie
zone 3b, northern MN                                                 


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