Iris miscellany
Antennaria@aol.com (Tue, 20 May 2003 19:34:27 PDT)

To Jim and PBS'rs,

Thanks Jim for putting my miscellany in some context... I particularly like
the chart breakdown to the specific photos I posted; I'm going to save that
for future reference until I get to know the genus Iris better.

The section Limniris also include a wide
range of 'beardless' irises including 16 distinct
series. One of these is the series
Chinenses which had been poorly represented
in cultivation until the past few years. The most
common species is the very small,
I. minutoaurea, but it is now possible to
purchase I. koreana, I. odaesanensis, I rossii
and others. Also in cultivation but not yet
commercial is the smaller still I henryi and
the larger I. speculatrix.

I was told quite succinctly by at least two people, that Iris rossii is not
in cultivation in the US and that it's very difficult to grow. Is there
really a commercial source of Iris rossii here in the US? Please tell me
there is. The fine photo of I. rossii in your book Iris of China by James
Waddick and Zhao Yu-tang (which I should've mentioned in my previous message,
a "must have" for anyone interested in Iris), reveals that it's a highly
desirable species.

This past weekend I photographed several plants of Iris henryii, a really
choice little species with very narrow grassy leaves and light blue flowers.
The photo I took turned out rather color-faded, but at least it gives some
sense of this fine Iris. Here's the link to the PBS wiki photo (I haven't
added the link on the wiki page yet, it's only available from this email...
will catch up and add it later).

http://pacificbulbsociety.org/pbswiki/files/…

I also recently acquired a small division of Iris minutoaurea, which I'm
excited to add to my small growing collection of Iris.

Mark McDonough Pepperell, Massachusetts, United States
antennaria@aol.com "New England" USDA Zone 5
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