In Santa Barbara, you'd probably want to dig them up in November or December. You might have some luck now, but the weather has been exceptionally warm lately and we don't look to be getting much rain anytime soon. I've divided this time of year and had modest luck with those immediately planted back in the ground...not so much those saved and potted up. Here in Los Angeles, I'm seeing new green growth on my Iris, and at the Payne Foundation there's an Iris already blooming. --- On Sun, 2/3/13, Gastil <marygastil@yahoo.com> wrote: From: Gastil <marygastil@yahoo.com> Subject: [pbs] Pacific Coast Iris - best time to transplant? To: "pbs@lists.ibiblio.org" <pbs@lists.ibiblio.org> Date: Sunday, February 3, 2013, 11:35 AM hi Kathleen and other PCI growers, My only experience with these is to buy them in a gallon pot from our botanic garden, plant them, and then do absolutely no maintenance whatsoever for 2 decades. They multiply and bloom all on their own. I do not cut-back, water or dead-head them and I seldom weed them. One clump is now invaded with Bermuda grass which is difficult to eradicate so I have to dig it up to get those grass rhizomes out. The only times I have tried to transplant these kind of iris they all promptly died. So, my question is: which season is best to dig these up? Right now they have small new shoots emerging. I vaguely remember mine might be I. douglasiana or a cultivar or hybrid of those. It is the white blooming clump which I have to dig up. They are definitely Pacific Coast Irises. - Gastil Santa Barbara, California (on the Pacific Coast)