Blooming

With all this sun and sudden increase in temperature the Iris are sprouting as fast as they can!. Although a bit less vigorous than the last couple of years almost everything is spiking and flowering. A coupled of the new additions have flowered, some though are resolutely refusing to show anything remotely resembling a flower spike. (Spring Blush, Marden Meadow, Mermaid Street and Grachus)

Snow Fiddler, Ozark Maid, Poker Chips and Daemon Imp are all spiking so flowers in the next week I hope.

The result of the cold is some short spikes and low down flowers on normally tall willowy bloomers. Dancing Lilacs (usually one of the tallest) is producing flowers within the fans...looks very odd indeed and rather cramped too.

Slow

Oh this season is dragging. Quite a few spikes now and even one flower starting it's thrust out of the papery wrapping but not one flower!

We are already 3+ weeks later than last year (Claire Doodle April 22nd), which admittedly was very early and in relation to 2010 we are probably along the same timing lines. That said watching plant after plant (flower) spike and then pause for a week or more (a New Idea spike now at 10 days and counting) is torture.

A good week of warmer, sunnier weather will have them out, though I'm sure they will flower in spite of the current miserable cloudlings and paltry temperatures but waiting, that's the thing. I am not a very patient woman, can you tell?!

Sun

I am longing for some sun. Not only for me but for the Iris, they are now sending up lengths of flowering spike with fat buds waiting to open but not one single flower has emerged, very frustrating all this waiting.

About 15 of the 120 potted Iris have spikes, which is on the low side. I'm putting it down to dividing a bit heavily (i.e small rhizomes!) on the less vigorous varieties. It's all good information for the future and I am recording pages and pages of behaviour when I remember!

My ex-partner in crime tells me she is recording the number of flowers per plant and spike on the backup collection she is developing and managing, which is noble in the extreme. I feel sort of obliged to do the same but know that I will never be quite that organised. I shall admire her efforts though.

First up......

Very unusually this year, Ben a Factor and Enriched are up first, although I suspect the others are sulking having been transplanted last Summer.

Enriched hase spikes on ALL it's stock plants, Enriched has about half spiking.

Nothing else is spiking but all of them are putting on some good leaf growth with all this water and of course the food they had a week or so ago.

Potted specimens are also showing signs of spiking, New Idea being the only one actually spiking. Leafage going mad here too but that's to be expected given it's so much more sheltered in the garden.