Right now the garden is in its 'in-between' mode; the early spring flowers (bulbs) are finished, the late spring flowers are pretty well done and it is nothing but green as I wait for the summer flowers to start to bloom. One of the greatest challenges of being a gardener I think is in trying to arrange for colour throughout the growing season, but after all of these years I think I am finally getting the hang of it.
One of our favourite flowers is the iris. Unfortunately they have such a short growing season. I took these pics awhile ago and decided to include them today so that I can recall the stages of garden growth when the bitter winter kicks in.
In our garden there are two types of bearded iris - dwarf and the giant bearded type. The dwarf iris are planted in the front of the house and they seem to spread like wildfire - the two small plantings are now two HUGE plantings which need to be split. I actually did split some last year and the ones I planted in the side garden are doing quite well. There are two colours: a pale blue and a deep purple.
In the back gardens we have four types of bearded iris:
A chocolate brown iris which seems to do really well where it has been planted. The huge blooms last for a long and the plant seems to be multiplying nicely.
A less showy yellow and mauve bearded iris. The blooms are less showy than the large bearded iris. They appear to be more delicate yet them seem to have more staying power. This one was a gift from a neighbour down the street who showed up one day with the roots (rhizomes) and asked if we wanted it. What gardener says no to free plants?
This one has large peach coloured flowers. It tends to get the most compliments of them all. Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be very prolific; I don't think it is spreading and it never has more than one flower stalk.
This one is my favourite. The flowers are variegated with a creamy white and purplish blue. This plant is quite prolific both with blooms and with spreading. I have split it twice and it is ready to be split again - yeah.
The Canadian Iris Society has an informative website and includes tips for gardeners. This is the tip for this month:
Quick Tip on Iris Growing for May-June
Enjoy the fruits of your labor. Some nice iris should be blooming in your garden at this time. As a gardener, I know you probably don't like to just sit around, so here is something to think about... After all the blooms are completed, clean up the garden by snapping off the stalks at the junction of the stalk and rhizome. The technique is as follows; grasp firmly near the bottom of the stalk, bend-twist-snap and the stalks break off cleanly from the rhizome with minimum effort. With a little practice this technique is becomes very easy to do. This type of after-bloom cleanup is more preferable than cutting the stalks as there is less chance for rot and infection from the remaining portion of stalk, it is also quicker than cutting. Try it and see. Why do this at all? Besides having a nice clean, good looking garden, it opens up the iris planting to better air circulation and allows more sunlight to reach the rhizomes. This promotes better and stronger, healthier rhizome increases so that you have another great season next year! C.H.
Those are beautiful. My irises do fair~ they bloom very early in spring here.
The daylillies do great here.
In fact, I might aught to post mine... thanks for the idea.
Posted by: sandi @ the whistlestop cafe | June 17, 2007 at 04:19 PM
Sandi - I think irises do best in mild temperatures - they do not seem to enjoy heat and humidity.
When you're updating us on your garden how about an update on those upside down tomato plants?
Posted by: JDeQ | June 18, 2007 at 07:01 AM