36 A REMINDER TO PLANT TO HELP 



the center will gradually cease to bloom. When this condition 

 exists, if it is not convenient to transplant, the ground should be 

 enriched in the spring with a top dressing of bone meal. 



If the same spot is to be used for replanting it will usually be 

 well to first add to the soil a little bone meal. 



Irises planted in the fall, especially if planted late, should be 

 given a covering of an inch or so of some light material that will 

 not pack and hold moisture, as loose straw, as soon as the ground 

 freezes, to lessen the danger from alternate freezing and thawing, 

 and this should be raked off in the spring. Established clumps 

 will winter well without protection. 



Diseases and Enemies The Iris is little subject to disease or 

 the attack of insects. Rot caused by fungi, induced by extreme 

 moisture and insufficient drainage, or by manure, is the principal 

 trouble to be guarded against. There is a moth which, in some 

 seasons, in some sections of the country occasions more or less 

 injury. It lays its eggs in the leaf sheath during the fall, and the 

 larvae bore in the rhizome, causing the foliage to turn yellow and 

 finally die, while the rhizome becomes a rotting slimy mass. 

 The insects do not cause the rots directly but merely make wounds 

 for the entrance of fungi. The falling of the leaf to the ground, 

 although still green and fresh-looking, is often the first indica- 

 tion that there is anything wrong with the plant. As soon as 

 the trouble is noticed dig up the plant and cut or scrape away, 

 down to the sound tissue, all the decayed portion, which has an 

 extremely offensive smell, and burn it. Dip the remainder of 

 the plant, leaves and all, into a solution of potassium perman- 

 ganate about a teaspoonful of the crystals to a quart of water 

 and then replant in well drained ground and if possible in a 

 fresh situation. 



As a preventative of rot some extensive Iris growers dress the 

 ground, before planting, with superphosphate of lime about a 

 pound to five square yards or apply a 4 per cent formalin solu 

 tion about six tablespoonfuls of the usual commercial 40 per 

 cent solution of formaldehyde, to a quart of water and spray 

 the plants in spring and early summer, at intervals of a month, 

 with some disinfectant, as a 2 per cent solution of formaldehyde 

 about three tablespoonfuls of formaldehyde to a quart of water 



