When the plants are 3 to 4 inches high, with definite shape 

 to the fan. get ready to transplant into permanent location. 

 Have yonr rows for permanent location ready ; have your rec- 

 ord markers ready; wet the seed bed the night before trans- 

 planting. Slip a blunt table knife alongside a plant and lift it 

 out, carefully, with enough dirt attached to protect the young 

 rootlet. Set in place one at a time, a foot apart and in rows at 

 least a foot apart. Keep the ground clean, moist, but not wet. 

 Stir the ground every day for a mulch. Despite the fact that 

 adult iris plants are usually hardy, the little seedlings are very 

 tender until good root growth has been established. Occasion- 

 ally firm the little plants down with the fingers to promote 

 deeper root growth. If you can get them up to a foot in height 

 they will carry on themselves, but keep the rows clean and 

 cultivated. 



Your largest plants will bloom the next spring and practically 

 all will bloom the second year. 



In the spring following the planting, watch your plants for 

 buds and at dawn some morning in May or early June, go into 

 your garden, alone, and watch the unfolding of a new flower, 

 which you have produced, the like of which is not to be found 

 elsewhere in the world, and if this does not generate a pleasur- 

 able thrill within you, then you are not of the Iris Clan and this 

 little leaflet has been written in vain. 



Everyone should have a hobby ; it's good for the soul. Mine 

 is raising iris. Try it ; it's the best outdoor sport for a one-man 

 or one-woman team yet devised ! 



MAKING THE IRIS CROSS 



The enthusiast who contemplates ''home-made" iris must, first 

 of all, acquire a knowledge of the parts, or sex organs, of the iris 

 flower. Nature has provided efficiently against cross polleniza- 

 tion in iris by placing the anther, which bears the pollen, in a 

 curved groove directly below the fttigma. which protrudes like a 

 tiny shelf above it, and Avhich must be fertilized on the upper 

 surface. At first glance, the hpord or rrrst of many irises looks 

 as though it were the pollen-bearing part of the flower. But if 

 the fall, or lower petal, be lightly pulled down, the actual stamen 

 will be found tucked away neatly against the style ann. appear- 

 ing, in fact, to be a part of it. If the stamen is followed down to 

 its base, however, it will be found joined to the base or Jiaft of 

 the fall. As the iris flower is constructed in multiples of three, 

 it has three sets of each of the parts mentioned. 



^2iy 



