IRIS FAMILIES YOU OUGHT TO KNOW 
WILLIAM RICKATSON DYKES 
Author of "The Genus Iris,” Secretary The Royal Horticultural. Society 
• 
A Brief Study, by the Authority on Iris, of Resemblances and Differences 
Between Some of the Less Familiar Members of this Great Group 
S T IS difficult perhaps for one who has always gardened 
in the island climate of the south of England, to foretell 
the behavior of the various I ris species when cultivated 
in America. But the fact that most species are natives 
of countries possessing a continental climate, with 
greater extremes of heat and cold than we usually 
experience in England, would seem to indicate that, 
on the whole, Irises should be easier to cultivate with 
success in the northern states 
than in England. In shel- 
tered southern districts, how- 
ever, where vegetation is 
practically unchecked 
throughout the winter 
months, there will probably 
be difficulties in the way of 
flowering certain species 
which in their natural con- 
ditions lie dormant for sev- 
eral months. 
To many people the men- 
tion of an Iris suggests merely 
either a Bearded Iris, such as 
germanica, or else perhaps some 
form of Spanish Iris. There are, 
however, a number of others, 
very different from either of 
these types, which well deserve 
a place in our gardens and which 
will extend the flowering season 
of Irises far beyond the limits 
covered by these two types. 
Here in England, for instance, we 
can usually rely on getting numbers of 
blooms from the Algerian 1. unguicularis 
or stylosa from October to March, except 
during periods of hard weather when the 
buds are killed by the frost. The lilac- 
purple flowers are deliciously scented, and 
it is fascinating to pick a handful of buds 
and watch them unfold in the warm atmos- 
phere of a room. This Iris belongs to the 
great section of Apogon or Beardless Irises. 
This Iris would seldom flower in the open 
I imagine, in the Eastern States at any rate; 
but on the other hand the small bulbous 
Irises, on which we rely for flowers during 
the first three months of the year, all come 
from Asiatic regions with cold winters. Ac- 
tually these suffer here from the fart that a 
mild spell leads them to suppose that the 
winter is over and to put forth their flow- 
ers and their foliage, only to have the latter 
destroyed or damaged, and their bulbs cor- 
respondingly weakened, during ensuing win- 
ter weather. These early bulbous Irises be- 
long to two sections: — the reticulatas, so 
called because their bulbs have netted outer 
coats; and the Junos, which are distinguished 
by the fact that the bulbs in their resting 
state have adhering to them a number of 
thick fleshy store-roots, which must be preserved intact if 
the plants are not to be weakened. 
The wild Iris reticulata comes from the Caucasus and has red- 
purple flowers with narrow four-sided leaves. It is sometimes 
grown under the name of Krelagei, but seems not to have so 
strong a constitution as the commoner so-called “type” with 
brilliant dark blue flowers relieved by a central orange ridge on 
the blade of the falls. There is also a pale blue form called 
Cantab — from the colors of Cambridge University — and many 
other color forms are to be found among seedlings 
derived from these three, ranging down to a red-black. 
In Northern Asia Minor 
there grows 1. histrioides 
with large bright blue flow- 
ers, and further south the 
less brilliant but more varia- 
ble I. histrio, of which I 
once received an extraordi- 
narily dark red-black form. 
The delicate, gray-blue, 
almond-scented I. Vartani is 
from Palestine and in the 
hills of Northern Mesopota- 
mia the brilliant little I. 
Bakeriana, whose flowers 
seem made of blue-black 
velvet, grows. As a contrast 
to these there is a single 
yellow-flowered species from 
Cilicia, I. Danfordiae. 
HE Juno Irises extend 
from the shores of the 
Western Mediterranean to the northwestern 
frontier of India, and contain among their 
number some excellent garden plants. The 
Spanish and Sicilian I. alata, 1. palestina 
and the Asia Minor species of the persica 
group are all difficult to manage — chiefly, per- 
haps, because being natives of stiff clay soil 
the single seedling bulbs cannot put out off- 
sets, and thus gradually extend and spread fur- 
ther and further. They have therefore devel- 
oped into shortlived species which reproduce 
themselves freely by seeds. On the other 
hand, I. bucharica, native of Bokhara, with 
the growth of a miniature Maize plant and a 
white and yellow flower in the axil of each leaf, 
seems to revel in a sandy soil and increases 
fast by means of offsets. 
Perhaps the most gorgeous of all is the 
Turkestan 1. Rosenbachiana, which sends up 
its flowers as soon as the snow melts and be- 
fore the leaves have time to develop to any 
extent. The flowers are sometimes white and 
a crimson purple, with a con- 
spicious golden crest; but 
others are of any shade of 
blue or red-purple while 
there are also rare examples 
of a pale straw-yellow. In 
