Late iris season in the PNW

[Garden_of_Mu]

Hope everyone's having a better season than we are. Once again we're having and extra long, cold, wet spring. The irises are a month behind normal, and the Convention is in Victoria, BC next week. Won't be much to see I'm guessing unless a heat wave comes on suddenly and gives it all a push. Anyway, here's some of the SDBs currently blooming here. They like the cool temps and are filled with blooms this year. I'll get some clump shots in the next few days.

[kHT]

Hey Mike, you are not alone. So slow here and we decided since the tulips were late not to go south to see the irises on Mother's day. I'll
just enjoy what is here. I am also noting not many blooms too? How about you? Usually by now the yard is so full of iris blooms but very few this
year. : (

[ThisIsMelissa]

Thanks for sharing those pics.... we've not yet seen any irises here in MN.... except the one in the 1g nursery pot I bought earlier this year.

I find that beigey color in the 2nd pic quite interesting. It's not a color you see in the garden very often... at least, not on something alive and beautiful like that iris!

I really wish iris bloomed longer. If it did, I'd have a lot more of them!

[Garden_of_Mu]

KHT- The sun this past few days has things moving along rapidly. I'm not sure how to compare the number of blooms so far as so little is going. Last year when this happened I noticed that there were fewer flowers out on the stalks than usual - warmer temps seemed to get more of them opening at once - but the flip side was a much longer period of bloom.

Melissa- I'm glad you liked the pics! The brown toned irises are my favorites, and that beige tone is actually quite often seen thru the decades as irises developed, however it's not always been popular so varieties with that color aren't wide spread. This one is a singular colortone tho - not as golden as is usually seen - and such a nice compliment to the lavender-blue blaze. I am loving it.

There are some irises that repeat bloom all summer and fall. For a non-stop show try 'Immortality'. Slow to get set in, but once it is stand back. Here, once it is well established (usually 2 years), it will bloom in spring and then again beginning in mid to late summer and all autumn long until freezes force it to stop. Not sure how reliable the rebloom it would be in MN tho - rebloomers tend to prefer mild climates. You can also extend the iris season by mixing the early blooming dwarfs with midseason Intermediates and late Tall Beardeds. Check out what Chris is offering here at Hallson's (he's got Immortality!) as they've expanded their iris list alot since the last time I checked it out. Since they are northerly too you might get some good ideas of what will bloom a long time in your climate. You might also check with Shadowood Irises, which is in MN, for other varieties that can take your climates challenges. I can also recommend the Siberian iris 'Pleasures of May' for it's long season of bloom, with continuous bloomstalks coming up for 6-8 weeks. And even without flowers so many irises have good foliage that adds to the garden scene and flower border all season long. Here's a blog post I wrote about it. http://theamericanirissociety.blogspot. ... value.html

[kHT]

Thanks Mike for sharing more!!

[oldcoot]

What beautiful photos, and you remember, OC loves Irises. He also had a long cool, wet spring, but it finally eased up about Easter. Then he had PLENTY of pretty blooms. Seemed that the rain made the pedals ever fuller. Thanks for posting. That Old Coot named John......