- Author: Christine Macgenn
In fall 2010 I was a first-time attendee at the Heirloom Festival in Santa Rosa. We had just bought our new home, and we were excited about all the garden space we had. The Heirloom Festival, for anyone who hasn't been to it yet, is to my mind gardener's heaven. Flowers, fruits, vegetables, tools, soil amendments, watering systems, you name it, it's there. My husband and I were like kids in a candy store.
I passed by the Napa County Iris Society's booth and the heirloom Irises they had on display took my breath away. I quickly purchased a little bag full of rhizomes! I got my instructions for planting them: leave the tops of the rhizomes slightly exposed above the soil, roots spread out and facing downward. I went home and promptly placed them ever-so-lovingly in the ground. Luckily, and I say luckily because I really didn't know what I was doing, I planted them in a place in the garden they absolutely love. Long hours of morning and early afternoon sun and then a nice bit of cooling afternoon shade. When spring arrived, I had a nice little row of gorgeous Irises. Did I know what any of them were? No. I had forgotten to put name labels in the ground with them. So, they became the white ones, yellow ones, purple ones and so on. To this day I don't really know. I think they are all bearded. I know they are all beauties.
Leap through time to this year and I noticed that my Irises had multiplied, and multiplied and multiplied. They were still beautiful but they were not thriving. Some were short-stemmed. Some of the blooms would wilt almost immediately and others wouldn't even open. They just didn't look the same. I also noticed that the rhizomes were now very large and rising up out of the dirt. They appeared to be very crowded, sort of growing on top of each other. Now what?
As fate would have it, I was at a social event in early September where I was introduced to a gentleman named Mark Richards. Lo and behold he is the owner of Pleasant Valley Iris Farm in Vacaville. If you haven't been to Pleasant Valley Iris Farm, put it on your list of places to visit. It's wonderful. (7317 Pleasants Valley Road, Vacaville, CA) You can also check out their website. It has links to lots of information and videos about Irises (www.irisfarmer.com).
Mark and I instantly became engaged in a fantastic conversation about Irises. I shared with him what was happening to mine and he emphatically told me it was time to pull them up, divide them, trim them and put them back in the earth. He went on to explain that late September just happened to be the ideal time of the year to do it.
I was so intimidated by the thought of digging them up that I could barely entertain the thought. Mark assured me it was a must! I decided to take a leap of faith. Here is a little photo essay of my experience. I got a shovel and started digging
What a mess…there were so many of them. Once I got in there I was amazed by how many there were! It seemed like hundreds. How do they do that? That is still a mystery to me.
I persevered. Trimming, cleaning, and then letting them dry for a few days. The good news is I had so many of these new rhizomes I was able to share them with friends and at the Master Gardener Plant Exchange. The bad news, I still haven't labeled them.
So when these beauties that are all in neat little rows now come up in spring, once again it will be a potpourri of nameless but very colorful delights! Stay tuned! And, if anyone knows what types of Irises these are please let me know!
A little blessing that came with my great Iris Dig – I had some volunteer Gladiolas that popped up among the Irises and I was able to separate them as well. I'm also looking forward to more of these striking Glads come spring. I can't wait!