ON HYBRIDIZING 
Let us reflect on the possibilities, as well as the known fine parents, of our favorite flower, and the 
necessary procedure in the creation of seeds which in turn produce the tiny plants from which 
innumerable seedlings develop to give us a few choice gems; some of these eventually find their 
way to fanciers throughout the world to bring joy and beauty to gardeners cnd gardens everywhere. 
The delightful thing in producing a fine iris is this very aspect. The breeder of a fine champion animal 
may share this animal with few (if a male), and if he is sold only one may own him. Count the gard- 
eners, if you can, who share the lovely creations of our hard-working hybridizers of iris! Measure, as 
well, their joy! Can it be done? 
MAKING THE CROSSES 
The processes necessary to hybridize iris are very simple and easy, if time consuming, but 
there is little necessity, if a fresh bloom is used as seed parent, to bag the flower to prevent outside 
contamination from foreign pollens or self-pollination. A few precautions may be employed, how- 
ever, such as the removal of all stamens (if the variety mckes pollen) and the three falls may be 
removed to prevent a bumble bee depositing unwanted pollens. Because of the location of the 
stamens tall bearded iris do not self-pollenize themselves, but it may hgppen pollen thrips will 
accomplish this feat which would account for the fact that (even without the presence of bumble 
bees) many tall bearded iris set some ‘‘chance’’ pods. While a good seedling might come from 
chance pods—it is only a remote wish and hardly worth the time and effort to grow these, and 
should a good iris result its true pedigree would never be known. It is more likely good seedlings 
will result from carefully planned hybridizing; one then knows the breeding of selected seedlings 
ond can, therefor, continue his hybridizing with care and wisdom. Since heredity plays an 
important part in the production of all living things it is very important we should know, so far as 
possible, the background of the iris used for hybridizing. So, it should be with care that we select 
ihe parents used. It may be one will desire to make a wide outcross so as to bring in new blood 
for some special purpose—for size, height, branching, smoothness of texture, etc. For example a 
goodly number of the Amoena colored flowers have been on the small side. A hybridizer may cross 
out to some other color—a white, a blue or even a blend, and it can hardly be expected the first 
generation will deliver the Amoena sought for—in fact the seedlings may very well be a nondescript 
conglomeration, none of which would seem to hold any promise as breeders, yet they should carry 
the genes for Amoena coloring and may, very well, carry factors for size and other qualities— 
even vigor and ease of germination, etc. Therefore it is the task of the hybridizer to cross back 
to Amoena blood or even to try some of these sister seedlings together which would give the F 2 
generation and a percentage of Amoena-flowered seedlings should result. And it may be still 
another generation (or more) when one’s patience will surely be rewarded. This same principle 
may be applied to all the various colors being sought. Some will be dominant and may be expected 
to give results in the first generation while others, like plicatas, and the new shell pinks, will, 
because they are recessives, appear in the F 2 and later generations. 
One must know the mechanics of making the cross, so it will be necessary here to describe 
this for the inexperienced hybridizer. The iris has a trinity of three parts, these are: three standards, 
three falls and three style arms upon which the stigmas grow. Under the three style arms are the 
three stamens which carry the pollen. As mentioned earlier, some varieties will be found to have 
no pollen, among these are Purissima, Snow Flurry, Wm. Mohr and others and they, therefore, 
may be used as pod parents only. The stigma is the lip (a shelf-like portion) on each of the style- 
arms. It may be necessary to pull back the split outer portion of the style arms to expose the 
stigma, which should be fresh and somewhat “frosty’’ in appearance—a dry stigma is useless 
to use in hybridizing. Pollen from the stamens may be spread directly on these stigmas; a brush 
is not recommended, for it may become contaminated with other pollen grains and one’s records 
may have no meaning, no accuracy. After the cross has been made a small marking tag should 
be written upon giving first the name of the pod parent, an "’x’’ and then the pollen parent. For 
example if Purissima is employed as the pod parent (the flower used) and Cloud Castle the pollen 
parent the cross would be marked thusly: (Purissima x Cloud Castle). One should make sure the 
tag upon which the cross is recorded is weather-proof. Many paper labels peel. One should, 
therefore, use wood-tree markers, non-peeling paper, plastic or aluminum markers. Equally 
important is the proper marking of the seedling bed, or field marker, for the various crosses, once 
the seed is planted or the seedlings set out—these should, likewise, be permanent. Personally I 
have used- planed wood stakes on which I write the crosses in permanent India ink. I much 
prefer to write quite a detailed account of the cross on the stake to giving each cross’a number 
and having a corresponding number in a record book, for time is often precious during the 
blooming period and extra record books, etc., are rather a nuisance. A book to record the selections 
is a necessity. One may devise any number of various methods of keeping these records, however, 
the most generally used method is to give the first selection the number "']”’ with the year either 
immediately before or after this number. For instance the first selection made in 1951 could read 
either: 51-1 or 1-51. Sister seedling selections can be numbered the same adding A, B, C, etc., for 
the second, third, and so on from the cross, making the keeping of records less intricate and saving 
some time in giving each selection a different number. This method is also advantageous in the 
keeping of pollen from the various sister seedlings for it will be stored in one position in the pollen 
box and one need not remember several various numbers or to search through the file for any 
desired pollen. 
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