Many thanks to Mike in Oly:
Now that the iris bloom season is mostly over I thought I would send some photos and a garden report from the beautiful city of Olympia in the great PNW.
It was an odd season to be sure. The cold spring temps stayed late into May which greatly delayed the irises getting going, and then we immediately jumped into the upper 80s which sent them rocketing upward all at once.
Half of my big bed with the oldest stuff, mostly diploids from pre-1920, was absolutely
overflowing with blooms. A really fantastic show.
The other half (mostly 1930 thru 1960s varieties) was not so exuberant and showed up later and with less enthusiasm, but just as much beauty.
My variety ‘Juliet’ took Best of Section at the local iris show, but was not good enough to take Queen Of Show.
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I need more pictures, people!
What’s going on in your garden(s), this week?
JPL
Lovely pictures.
satby
Fantastic Mike! I’ll have to order Juliet, it’s in my favorite color range and would look great with some iris I already have. Edit: is the 4th picture also of Juilet?
Damn, Schreiner’s doesn’t seem to carry it 😕
JPL
Happy Father’s Day
kalakal
Great pics.
What a lovely display
satby
@JPL: oh, yeah. Happy Father’s Day to all the Fathers and men who have been father figures in kids’ lives. My kids and countless others were helped along by men who mentored them when their own father dropped the ball. You are appreciated.
JeanneT
Beautiful blossoms! We had rain on Thursday, so some of the plants in my yard are reviving, including the grass & misc. in the backyard, so today I need to mow. That’ll be after I get home from the grandkid’s 4th birthday party: he’s old enough to help me pull weeds now!
Jeffro
@JPL:
@satby: I was gonna say the same thing – happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there!
My kids are both out of town today, so we’re celebrating next Sunday. =)
SiubhanDuinne
Wow! Irises are stunning — thank you, Mike in Oly!
OzarkHillbilly
Another hallmark holiday, Blech.
But the iris pics make it so much better! Thanx, Mike.
satby
@OzarkHillbilly: and we all love you, you old poop 😘
Happy Father’s Day
JPL
Here’s for all the old poops out there..
Joe Heller
Dorothy A. Winsor
What great pics to wake up to.
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: My eldest and I always go floating on F day. It seems important to him and I will use any excuse to spend a day with him. This past week he called, very apologetic because it wasn’t going to happen for… Some reason or other.
I told him, “It’s just another hallmark holiday and means nothing to me.” Then I said something about spending the day with his daughters as they were what really mattered.
FTR, I feel the same about all holidays, just another pothole in the road of life.
Jeffg166
After 6 weeks of no rain the garden is barely hanging on. It looks dreadful. It did rain twice their past week. One storm dropped 1.5” and the other .5” too fast to really soak in. Things are revived but the spring bloom will not happen or happen poorly. Oh, well that’s gardening.
CCL
So lovely! What a gorgeous wall of irises!
OzarkHillbilly
@JPL: I have a 6′-6″ caving friend who must have grown another 6″ when he got down on his knees to show my youngest son how to stem his way the length of a 30′ deep canyon passage.
The first time M did it standing up and my 4′ tall son said, “I can’t do that!”
I still crack up at the memory of it.
J.
Wow! I love irises. And those are gorgeous!
SkyBluePink
Exquisite!
Gvg
Lovely. Bearded iris mostly don’t grow this far south. There are supposed to be a few that work but I haven’t tried them yet.
The last few days have had some major rain storms. We needed it but having downpours in the morning instead of afternoons with tornado warnings on the way to work instead of the way home was weird and caught people off guard. Then we had more rain on the way home.
Trying to get my blackberries trellised off the ground so the berries don’t get spoiled.
OzarkHillbilly
We are in drought conditions here, so I have spent a lot of time watering the gardens. We’re supposed to get a fair rain this afternoon so I’m keeping my fingers crossed. Despite the late start on the veggie garden things are progressing fairly well.
I planted Elephant Ear and Caladium bulbs in a few strategic locations. It took forever for the first shoots to come up. Just when I was ready to give up and plant something else in those locations where nothing happened, a few more came up. All of the Elephant Ears are up now (the last first showed 2 days ago) but most of the caladiums are still hibernating, which makes me wonder, at what point do I give up?
Ken
And this one was signed into law by Richard Nixon, if you need more reasons to blech.
Jeffg166
@OzarkHillbilly: They like water. They do take time to come up. I would start them in pots first then move them into the ground when the plant was up and growing with a good root system. You could start them inside by a window if you have that option.
StringOnAStick
It got down to 40 last night, snowed in the Cascade mountains. The next two nights the NWS says 34 degrees, so I will be covering everything tender, just in case.
Miss Bianca
It’s been a cold and rainy June so far in the central mountains in CO, but today it’s supposed to start warming up and next week it’s supposed to get into the 80s, finally, after weeks of temperatures in the mid-60s at best.
Last night had a happy hour gathering at the neighbors’ and saw my first irises of the season in their garden. Love irises! Thanks for the photos!
Dan B
Impressive quantity and selection of TBI’s. I had a couple friends who were Iris Society members. I only grow PC’s and Japanese but did try a few Tall Bearded. One was a gorgeous blue ‘Victoria Falls’ which an employee who was an Iris Society member dead panned, “Victoria Falls, perfect description.” since it inevitably ended up with its blooms lying on or near the ground.
Glidwrith
You need more pictures? Yes, ma’am, on their way!
Mike in Oly
@satby:
The fourth pic is Nuevo Laredo. I think you’d have a hard time finding Juliet. It is rather a rare old variety. I doubt it is in commercial production anywhere. Nuevo Laredo is likewise incredibly rare. It is likely only in two gardens at this point – mine and the collector I got it from. Sorry to tease you with varieties that cannot be easily had, but that is what I like to grow the most. The rarer the better to my eye.