{"id":229,"date":"2009-04-15T13:56:42","date_gmt":"2009-04-15T19:56:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/?p=229"},"modified":"2009-04-15T13:56:42","modified_gmt":"2009-04-15T19:56:42","slug":"irises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/?p=229","title":{"rendered":"Irises"},"content":{"rendered":"

Despite the way their roots attack the pumps, we plant water iris in the larger permanent water features: they offer desirable habitat for odonates\u00a0 above water, and shelter for tadpoles, red-lined ribbon snakes, and other aquatic critters below the water surface.\u00a0 And though the “land” iris isn’t native here, I enjoy the older varieties that still mark out house-sites and yards in fields where a homesteader’s house has long vanished.<\/p>\n

\"yellow-water-iris307\"<\/p>\n

This robust yellow water iris multiples quickly and once more we need to yank about half of it out of the big pond–but it’s attracted hummingbirds and butterflies as well as the odes that perch on it and (some of them) use the stems to lay their eggs in.<\/p>\n

Less robust–it’s easily outcompeted by the taller, faster-multiplying yellow–is this lovely blue water iris, native to East Texas and Louisiana.<\/p>\n

\"blue-iris300\"<\/p>\n

In a wet year, we planted both varieties (taken while reducing the numbers in the yard water feature) down in the creek woods, in one of the overflow channels.\u00a0 They have survived, but die back in dry years–and the blues, my favorite, may not survive this drought down there.\u00a0\u00a0 When they bloom next to the “swamp overflow” they are stunning.<\/p>\n

I like most irises, and am grateful for gifts of starts from local residents, but if I have a favorite it’s this soft, delicate peach.\u00a0\u00a0 We have planted iris in the angles of the “snake fence” made from old fence posts.<\/p>\n

\"peach-iris310\"<\/p>\n

The “land” irises we have survive with little or no watering and I love the “homestead” look of the rail fence and the iris in its niches.\u00a0 Also growing on the fence now is a Virginia creeper, and one of the very old rambling roses (dark, dark red, small flowers) is now crawling up the far side.<\/p>\n

In our climate, irises are invasive only in water gardens, so it’s safe to plant even the non-native ones in a mostly-native landscape, or leave them in place if you find them.\u00a0\u00a0 Only the hardy will survive without extra water.\u00a0\u00a0 The commonest “old homesite” varieties are a pure white (smaller than most modern ones) and a rich yellow (same yellow as the water iris.)\u00a0\u00a0 There’s also a hardy small purple and small blue-lavender.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In an intermittent pond\/slow stream, the water irises (which are native in many places)\u00a0 may survive and will propagate only slowly; in permanent water of the right depth they will spread with amazing speed, like cattails.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Despite the way their roots attack the pumps, we plant water iris in the larger permanent water features: they offer desirable habitat for odonates\u00a0 above water, and shelter for tadpoles, red-lined ribbon snakes, and other aquatic critters below the water surface.\u00a0 And though the “land” iris isn’t native here, I enjoy the older varieties that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21,7],"tags":[13,32,70],"class_list":["post-229","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-photography","category-plantlife","tag-beauty","tag-native-plants","tag-photography"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=229"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":233,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229\/revisions\/233"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.80acresonline.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}