86 GARDEN GUIDE 



Iris (Iris pseudacorus). These two Irises may well be used in water 

 gardens, but they will succeed perfectly in ordinary garden soil. The 

 wild Iris is hardly as beautiful as some of the others that might be 

 grown, but the yellow European Iris has luxuriant foliage and large, 

 clear yellow flowers, and deserves wider popularity. 



The Japanese Iris (I. Ksempferi) and the Siberian Iris (I. sibirica) 

 thrive very nicely at the edges of pools; they will not grow with their 

 crowns submerged, however. The flower of the Japanese Iris differs 

 from the others in being flat, the standards not being upright. There 

 are several forms of the flower; some have six petals and others, because 

 the standards are much abbreviated, are called three-petaled Iris. 

 The flowers are very large. They enjoy good fertility and a constant 

 stirring of the soil, which should never bake over the roots. The 

 Japanese Iris likes to be flooded when in blopm, but at no other time. 

 They bloom later than the other sorts and varieties can be selected 

 which bloom from mid- June till nearly the end of July. 



The Siberian Iris, with its blue or white flowers and grass-like 

 foliage, is surely a beautiful garden subject. It lends itself to being 

 cut also. The white variety, Snow Queen, with its golden blotch on 

 the falls, is excellent, as are also the intense blue orientalis varieties, 

 ^either the Japanese nor the Siberian Iris is insistent upon being 

 planted in moist soil. 



Under " Bulbs " we have given a discussion of the Spanish and 

 English Irises. Perhaps no group is so universally successful to 

 grow, requiring so little care as does the German Iris group. They 

 are very hardy and stand all sorts of adverse conditions, growing in 

 the parched soil under the eaves of houses, thriving where children 

 tramp the soil to the hardness of a cement pavement, blooming under 

 trees choked by grass, and still giving flowers as pretty as an orchid. 

 They should always be planted quite on the surface of the soil, and 

 are best placed in bold groups. So rapid is the multiplication that if 

 a fine variety costs a dollar it usually produces so rapidly that the 

 same plant will give five or ten dollars worth of stock for another 

 year. The dwarf varieties of German Iris are known as pumila 

 hybrids. When the tall varieties were crossed with the dwarf varieties 

 an intermediate group resulted, known as intermediate or interregna 

 varieties. The blooms are large and most exquisite in color. The 

 range of colors in German Iris is extraordinary, varying from pure 

 white to deepest yellow, purple and violet and including delicate 

 lavender blue and even approaching to pink. The pumila varieties 

 are the earliest to bloom in this group, usually early May. They are 

 followed by intermediate, then last the tall, a few of which open in 

 late May or early June. 



