previous page
- 9 -
next page
| title page |
previous page |
- 9 - |
next page |
THE CULTIVATION OF TALL
BEARDED IRISES.
BY
SIR
ARTHUR
F. HORT,
Bart.
MUCH has been written about
the cultivation of the Iris, not a very recondite mystery so far
as most members of the genus are concerned.
.....But
readers of this journal will be glad to exchange experiences,
inasmuch as our little island presents a very great variety of
conditions. I hope that some of our Society will be able and willing
to contribute practical suggestions for growing some of the more
exacting species, in which category (to say nothing of the Oncocyclus
group) I at least should put arenaria, nepalensis, sikkimensis,
gracilipes and veins. It is well to begin with a group which,
taken as a whole, presents little difficulty: the great "tall
bearded' group are mostly everybody's plants, yet, as to grow
a thing is not always to grow it well, there is room even here
for discussion of the how, the when, and the where. In the hope
that others will do the like I will be frankly egotistic and simply
put down my experiences for what they are worth.
.....My
interest in the subject dates back to about the beginning of the
present century, when, infected I know not how by the iritis disease,
I began a series of annual visits to Sir Michael Foster's Chalk-hill
Garden at Shelford, near Cambridge. On each occasion after the
first I went armed with a sack, which I conveyed back to Harrow,
filled with rhizomes. These sackfuls were the foundation of my
little collection, which has been supplemented by the gifts of
other friends, and by my own seedlings. I have also done a little
collecting on my own account, chiefly of Varieties of Iris Germanica
in the south of France, and of Cengialti about the head of the
Lago di Garda.
At Harrow I grew Irises successively in two gardens; in either
case the sub-soil was London clay, which contains little or no
lime, the top soil is what is called "old kitchen garden
soil," a rather heavy black loam. Under such conditions a
slope is clearly desirable to secure better drainage, and fortunately
Harrow gardens are mostly pitched at a fairly steep angle.
.....I very soon gave up using stable manure, as being likely to encourage rhizome rot. Some part of the ground devoted to Irises was thoroughly dug in July about every third year, when all the bonfire ashes available and a liberal amount of mortar rubbish were added. I never used any chemical except superphosphate of lime for a few invalids put into a separate piece of hospital ground after the severe visitation of "rot," which most Iris growers above a certain age will remember. This scourge bade fair to wipe out my collection one season; in subsequent years it occurred sporadically, but never again became epidemic. (Foster told me that he always had it, more or less, at Shelford.) There was, however, another trouble, which, rightly or wrongly, I ascribed to the effect of damp winters on a heavy soil, not too well drained. Every spring a certain number of plants came up unsatisfactorily, the leaves only growing two or three inches and then turning yellow; the plant in fact appeared to be remaining dormant. I used to go round once or twice with a fork and dig up and burn any unhappy looking subjects, and it generally proved, when the plant was lifted, that the rhizomes were hard and apparently sound, but that no new roots had been formed. I should be interested to know if this is a common experience, and to hear other suggestions as to the cause of this "arrested growth." I have not, so far, noticed it in my present well-drained garden. At Harrow my chief Iris borders get very little sun in winter. American and other visitors have surmised that such success as I obtained there was due to "high cultivation"; this, however, is a delusion, if the term implies any elaborate cultural attention; my own belief is that elaborate feeding of these plants, who are at home on stony hill-sides, would probably tend to produce foliage rather than flowers. A roasting summer does more towards producing a flowery next season than anything that the gardener can do. The great
| title page |
previous page |
- 9 - |
next page |