Spring flowering tree

a large Amelanchier bordering the horse run

The first spring after we moved here, I noticed small white trees flowering in early May. They weren’t found in great numbers in any one locale but were lightly sprinkled among the other trees, especially along tree margins and in transition areas bordering open fields and along roadsides. They hadn’t shown up in the meager resources I read before coming here and were a delightful surprise discovering them. But what were they?

Without a huge amount of sleuthing, I found out they were Amelanchier (am-el-AN-keer), a name that begins flowing off the tongue after the 372nd utterance. It's no wonder it has a stable of common names: Serviceberry, Juneberry, Shad Bush, and my favorite, Shad Blow. Like salmon and steelhead, shad are fish that migrate from salt to fresh waters to reproduce, their spring runs coinciding with the blooming of this tree, hence the name.

Locally common but not abundant, they are mostly found in part shade in the company of other trees. I have found them on dry hillsides and almost boggy lowlands but suspect they prefer soils that are moist and well draining.

It isn’t until they flower that their Rose family inclusion is apparent. Small sprays of flowers are white with a tint of pink and have many stamens, a typically rose characteristic. Fruits are black colored when mature and are relished by birds. The oval leaves are distinctive enough for identifying trees when out of bloom and are complimentary to the branching structure.

One of the odd things I noticed last year was early leaf drop in August, depriving us of their autumn tones of beige and rust. I don’t know if it was the excessive rains or earlier predation from Eastern Tent Caterpillars but Amelanchier and other small trees were under stress and defoliated early.

full picture of my May header

Green-eyed but not envious

I posted again at Cold Climate Gardening.

I thought of it as a here's-my-problem and here's-my-solution kind of post but realize readers' confusion for writing about a plant so early before its season. Now is an excellent time for transplanting them into your garden, allowing for root growth to establish them and producing a respectable showing during bloom later this year.

Watering needs

I have a post on the watering tools I use and why I use them over on Cold Climate Gardening.

Iris - wrapping it up

I'm looking forward in the future to introducing myself to the Louisianas, their rich tones of rusty browns and other colors providing an interesting counterpoint to the rest of the garden. I've only just started with a few shade lovers and want to grow more. I also have one Japanese Iris, ensata 'Momojido', and want to perfect my growing of it; it is a sorry little plant and has not thrived. Perhaps moving it or replenishing its soil will work but sometimes there is an incompatibility, the relationship is not in equilibrium. That sometimes happens in gardening, the wrong plant in the wrong garden, and then it's time to find a new home for it with someone else. I'm not upset if it happens and want only the best for it, it will be an amicable parting.

Native to the Northern Hemisphere, Iris are grown and enjoyed worldwide. From high alpine ridges to deep forests, and deserts to wetlands along with many grasslands, Iris are found. Some have been used medicinally and others show up as representative symbols for royal houses and youth organizations. There is something about their recognizable flowers that is so appealing and on many levels. Their world is deep and large and I must explore further. I've often thought that a garden without Iris is the weaker for it and makes a statement about the gardener.

For more information please visit:

• AIS: American Iris Society
• Historic Iris Preservation Society
• Species Iris Group of North America
• North American Species introducing us to what's always been here
• Species Iris Database with interactive capability

For specific classes and types of Iris visit:

• Tall Bearded Iris Society
• The Median Iris Society
• Reblooming Iris Society
• Dwarf Iris Society of America
• Society for Pacific Coast Native Iris
• Society for Siberian Iris
• Spuria Iris Society and another Spuria Iris Society
• Society for Louisiana Iris
• Society for Japanese Iris
• Japanese Iris tribute page by a Belgian enthusiast
• Aril Society International has good eye candy

International Iris Societies

• Canadian Iris Society
• British Iris Society
• Danish Iris and Lily Society
• Italian Iris Society
• French Iris and Bulbous Plants Society
• Gesellschaft der Staudenfreunde is the Iris branch of the German Perennials Society
• Middle-European Iris Society
• Russian Iris Society
• Japan Iris Society and in English
• New Zealand Iris Society
• Iris Society of Australia
  
• South Australian Iris Society

Iris Research from Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden which includes a cool phylogeny of Iris based on DNA sequencing

Most of the societies have links for where to buy Iris but in case they might have missed some try:

• The Iris Page from Cyndi's Catalog of Garden Catalogs. Cyndi's is an enormous compendium of mail-order gardening sources.
• Cayeux a French Iris breeder. I enjoyed the pictures even though I don't know the language.

My Aunt and Uncle used to visit us while I was growing up. We didn't see them very often, our lives were separate and didn't intersect much, and each visit was a pleasure. They have unique voices, on the order of old radio and movie stars, and I loved hearing them talk. My Aunt had a way of looking at you that let you know her expectations of you were pretty high and you didn't want to see her being disappointed with you.

When I was older I found out she loved gardening and eventually specialized with orchids, covering a small patio and growing them into perfection. She would lose herself with her gardening and plants, taking a respite from the day and replenishing her soul. Eventually they moved into a retirement community, and of course, bringing a few special plants with them. I don't know how my Aunt did it but she managed to secure a unit with a small garden, one of the few and rarely available. The scale was reduced, true, but the joy of being outside and involved with something she loved was still there. My Aunt passed away a few years ago and it's outside I feel closest to her, sharing the same processes, enjoying the weather, and feeling part of an ancient tradition. It's where I imagine Aunt Iris and her sisters, Rose and Fern, being forces of nature and taking on the world.

Still working on the Iris

I've been writing my Iris posts on the fly, scurrying to get them done and uploading them in a timely manner. I'm behind right now because of a few sleepless nights this week and trying to verify some of my facts in a future post are accurate.

But until then, how about some good news? We're in for a stretch of better weather here, from today through next week, with much higher temperatures and a true look at spring. A couple of bluebirds, male and female, were spotted here yesterday and I hope some insects are flying around for them. They were awfully pretty in the evergreens with a snowy background but at the same time it was weird. I'm glad they're back: the snows are receding, Salix sp. (Willow) and Acer rubrum (Red Maple) are blooming and we're on the right track, once again, for spring.

PCNs - a picture is worth...

If Irises are the rainbow flowers, then PCN (Pacific Coast Native) hybrids are the technicolor dreams of what the other Iris can only aspire. Advancing beyond all the rest, the layered combinations of colors often bleed and ooze into traceries of veins. Many have bold central blotches and splotches of contrasting colors, surpassing the ocellated eyes of peacock feathers. Their only rivals for that kind of patterning and coloration comes from some of the South African Moraeas and California Calochortus, but those are bulbs.

PCNs are not perfect and have their faults. They are not attractive without their flowers; calling them "rough" is being kind. The leaves often have brown edges and tips, looking haggard and beat up and without distinction. They require better than average drainage and part shade, being at home on slopes beneath the edges of trees. They have unproven hardiness here but I would still like to experiment with them, discovering for myself if it's possible they will survive and thrive. I would begin with straight species and close hybrids, seeking clones from high elevations or of proven cold tolerance. It is a challenge to grow them, no question, but it is one I would gladly accept.

I realized after I wrote my other post about PCNs that I was too excited discovering a new hybridizer and didn't adequately explain why I think they are at the pinnacle of all Iris breeding. I could go on and on, trying to describe them adequately and failing, piling on the adjectives but running out of them too soon. So instead of listening to me dishing up more blather, see for yourself.

This first section of plants are all winners of the Mitchell Award, given by the American Iris Society in recognition of the year's best new introduction of PCN. The award is named in honor of Sidney B. Mitchell, first president of the California Horticultural Society.


The next section is a sampling of work from top hybridizers.

'Clarice Richards' by Richards

'Menodocino Blue' by Canning

'Light Winds' by Ghio

'Lines That Rhyme' by Ghio

'Ocean Blue' by Ghio

'Pinole Princess' by Wood

'Pretty Boy' by Ghio

'Sunol Grade' by Ghio

The plants in this last section were all grown and photographed by Monterey Bay Nursery, a wholesale grower and major supplier of extensive lines of perennials, vines, exotic shrubs, and tender potted plants to Northern Californians. We used to live within four miles of them and sometimes "sneaked" in to purchase plants and look around. These pictures don't do the plants justice and it was always funny that many of them had color descriptors for names.

'Canyon Snow'
An outstanding plant known for its floriferousness, growth, and vigor.
This widely planted older variety is used as a standard against newer hybrids.

'Joey'

'Pink and Yellow'

'Plum and Yellow'

'Red Improved'

'San Andreas'

'Silver Circle'

'Upper Echelon'

'White and Purple'

Tomorrow: Wrapping it up

The other Iris

Iris pseudacorus

I think of this section of plants as the leftovers, the hodgepodge of exhaustion that are the second choice at plant sales for most folks, after the sexier stable mates of Beardeds and other Iris are gone. I'm not going to go on and on about how great or terrific these are and how each could be an essential and vital element in any garden. I'm just not. But I have grown all of them and found something admirable and desirable in each of them.

Whenever I hear the word "flag" used in relation to Iris, Iris pseudacorus is the first plant that comes to mind. Cleverly named "Yellow Flag", it is an easy and dependable grower, adaptable to a wide range of habitats and growing well under normal garden conditions. Its favorite environment is aquatic and it thrives in moist, wet, marsh, bog, and water-saturated soils. I haven't grown many of the water-loving Irises but from my experience and reading more, it can tolerate deeper waters than the rest. But don't think water is a crucial component for it and necessary for optimum health, it makes a fine garden plant when landlocked. Mine is the variety 'Sun Cascade', a double flowered selection that I'm not crazy about. My preference with Iris is for single flowers so my 'Sun Cascade' receives nothing special from me. Planted at the base of a Cercis canadensis (Redbud), it fills the void, superbly I grudgingly admit, between soil and lower branches. It is a difficult and trying site for most plants, with poor soil and an unending mashing of small and large rocks but the Iris doesn't care. It flowers reliably and abundantly each year and its foliage remains strong and blemish-free all season. Oh dear, it sounds like I'm liking it.

Iris pseudacorus

One of the floral details I like most about pseudacorus is a fine line of brown that is etched through its lower petals, the falls. Looking like its been painted by an artist using a feather for a brush, it moves an ordinary yellow flower into something more. This line of distinction is even more accentuated in the lighter primrose-colored varieties. If the regular ones are sun-colored then these are surely moon-glowed. Some may see them as too pale and washed-out, bleached by the sun and a mockery of it but I don't care, they are my favorites.

Iris 'Holden Clough'

Originating in the Lancashire countryside at Holden Clough Nursery is the surprisingly named Iris, 'Holden Clough'. Arising as an unknown hybrid or a deeply held secret, it is strongly apparent that pseudacorus is one of its parents. Similar in leaf but on a smaller scale, it has grown well. I never had great expectations for it because of a lack of close association and experience with it. But it's here now and doing fine, helping to fill a void during others' bloom cycles. Lost in the landscape at a distance, its true place is up close, where the intricate play of brown drawn on gold can be admired. If pattern and tone are your vice, then this is your fix.

Iris foetidissima

I have grown Iris foetidissima for many years, decades I confess, and appreciate its virtues. Chief among these is its adaptability for growing in shade, a difficult assignment for most plants. That it prefers such a location is noteworthy and its ability to compete with the surface roots of trees is stellar. Its leaves are so smooth they seem plastic and make a great contrast to other shade lovers. It has two vices that must be mentioned if you are considering this plant. The first fault can be deciphered from its name - foetidissima - to smell unpleasant, rank, or fetid. The odor is released when the leaves are crushed or broken, something I'm not in the habit of doing with my other plants so why this one? I don't find it to be strong or especially rank but to each their own nose. The other characteristic is not as easily excused: small ho-hum flowers that put the plain in Jane. But you should try to encourage as much flowering as possible because of its other great virtue - colorful seeds. Opening in the fall, the seedpods gaily display their bounty in shades of deep orange; that there are also white and golden seeded varieties seals the deal. As flashy as the flowers are modest, the seeds brighten up a shaded fall garden. Leave them on the plants and in time you'll soon have seedlings growing, creating drifts more becoming than anything I've done. As easy to transplant as other Iris, use them to fill holes or for profit or barter or even compost, there will be more. It reproduces without becoming weedy and I like that.

Iris spuria

I have scant experience with Spuria Iris, one plant I confess, but I've liked what I've seen. Great height is their hallmark and with their rigidly erect leaves I thought an arrow was buried up to its fletching. Mine flowered blue and purple mixed with bronze, presented for inspection without any bending from me. Not loving wet soils, they thrived on a well-drained slope. I don't currently have one but that doesn't mean I'm not looking. Most varieties are purple but other colors are making inroads so let's encourage the breeders to continue refining and expanding their range by speaking well of them in greater than hushed tones. The Iris, silly.

If Iris could be a canine, then brevicaulis would be a lap dog. Very short, no more than a foot, this moisture-lover meanders on long rhizomes about the ground, popping up new sections of itself quite a distance from the rest, as if playing a hiding game with itself and me. With palest blue flowers in spring, I can't help but like it, a plant with humor amidst the beauty.

There is a range of spring-blooming Iris available as bulbs for planting in the fall. One of my weaknesses is small plants, the things that are wee, and when they are replicas of larger plants, so much the better. I'll call them the little ones and they come in all the classic Iris colors: blue, purple, violet, yellow, and white. I had a discouraging experience with them once and it has kept me from growing them again. I had a range of colors and planted them into terracotta containers, imagining them growing into perfect displays of Irisdom. The garden snails had other plans for those plants and easily overran all my attempts to prevent them. I thought Irises were impervious to animal onslaughts but they must have better e-mail, servers, and cellulars than me. I have gotten over it, mostly, and should reintroduce myself to these miniatures.

My newest acquisition is Iris versicolor, a native. This will be its first year of flowering for me and I'm eagerly waiting for its palest of blue flowers to brighten a shaded bed. I had no hesitation jettisoning some Hostas to make room for it. As it increases in size and I augment it with others, maybe the whole bed will become Hosta-free.

I think as I reread this post my new motto must be: More Iris Please.

Tomorrow: PCN Iris reprise