Iris Bulbs for Color Foliage and Blooms

When planning a flower garden for your new home, or giving a new lift to an older planting, irises can provide the quick effect you need in color, foliage, and mass of bloom.

Perhaps you haven’t really seen irises lately. You may recall them as those early fleeting blooms in drab violets or washed out yellows seen everywhere some 40 years ago, thriving on neglect but adding little to the beauty or variety of the garden. Or maybe you have acquired a new taste for the iris, but find the catalogs filled with an overwhelming number of varieties described in poetic language , and promising a dazzling array of color, to your utter confusion.

First, because of their blooming height, and the “church and spire” effect of foliage and stalk. irises serve best in the bed or border where clumps are rather widely separated and placed toward the back of the planting. They can successfully be planted as accent clumps singly, or if space permits, in drifts. To me, there is no more unattractive planting of irises than a single line of unrelated colors and heights strung out in a line with no backing or companion growth.

Second, for a pleasing effect in a minimum of time, plant from three to five of the same variety in one location. In this way you will get a focal point of color and by the second year at least, be able to cut some blooms without ruining the garden picture. Avoid trying too many kinds until you have found definite places for them in your general planting scheme.

Third, if you want to blend colors in a grouping, use fewer of the dark or dominant colors and more of the light or subdued tones. For instance in a pastel grouping, three pale blues, two pinks and one cream might be indicated. One white might well dominate three or more blues or lavenders. For best color harmony, reds had best be planted only with yellows or tans, then using blends or bicolors, combine them with “self” colored varieties carrying the same color tones.

Naturally, in selecting iris varieties best suited to this area, different budgets must be considered. In this respect, the novice is fortunate, for there are literally thousands of available sorts in every price range. In my list I have grouped the choices in similar price ranges, giving as far as possible one or more varieties in each general color class. In the columns are selections for five, ten and twenty-five dollar budgets. In each case, your budget would cover the purchase of about eight of the varieties listed under that heading.

In the few spaces where there is no selection in your favorite color, you need have no hesitancy in moving over a column without disturbing either your budget or your garden picture very much.

Now in irises, what constitutes good garden performance? Adequate and consistent bloom first, I think. We grow irises primarily for color, and if bloom is sparse, or inconsistent from year to year, our garden picture suffers. Vigor and hardiness next… for no one likes to tend “sick” plants, or wait years for them to fill out their allotted space. Clarity and smoothness of color, graceful and adequate branching and sturdiness of stalk are desirable traits, for they must be appealing when viewed close up, either in the garden or as cut flower material. Form and substance are important, for today’s iris is not a “droopy” creation.

Detailed descriptions of the varieties listed here are not particularly necessary. Most standard catalogs contain adequate word pictures of these varieties, and you will End that all the varieties answer the requirements set out in the preceding paragraph. Perhaps a little discussion about buying would be in order… where to purchase, how to select, and when to take delivery.

Let’s assume you have never bought “name” irises before. In that case, you surely owe yourself a look before you leap.

So, having made some tentative selections from this list according to your color preference, visit the gardens (preferably two or more of them) and ask to see the varieties you have checked. Take note of their respective heights, quality of foliage and time of bloom.

In wet weather digging iris encourages the spread of fungus diseases, and makes later ground cultivation difficult. At this time of growth, the new rhizome is too small to be completely removed from the parent plant.

On the other hand, by early July, the iris rhizomes have matured, the ground has dried out, the grower has time to dig, wash, select, trim and pack the varieties which you have ordered after more careful selection, the rhizomes are in a relatively dormant stage and may be planted at your leisure.

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