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We had to transplant some of our iris this past spring as part of our (unsuccessful) effort to keep the deer out of our roses. As a result, some of them didn’t bloom during their normal blooming season. But Victoria Falls, a beautiful blue iris, decided to bloom in late October. I hope she is saying that she approves of her new location.
Flower Show Iris, Fairfield Glade, November 3, 2008.
Will the iris above be the last we have to bloom this year? This iris burst into bloom a couple of days ago, giving us some much-appreciated color in an otherwise drab flower garden.
There are a couple more iris flower stalks showing, but I’m not sure they will have a chance to bloom before they get nipped by frost. A cold front moved through yesterday and lows are predicted to be near or at the freezing level for the next few days. Lows like that are great for enjoying a roaring fire in the fireplace, but not for blooming flowers.
We were especially glad to see Floor Show bloom because it didn’t bloom this spring. I guess it thought we would enjoy it more in the fall!
Queen Dorothy Iris, Fairfield Glade. October 9, 2008.
We had another iris bloom this week. Queen Dorothy, the re-blooming iris shown above, had bloomed in the spring and has honored us with another display.
About half of the iris we have in our flower beds are re-blooming, and we enjoy the autumn displays since we don’t have a great many other flowers in bloom in those beds this time of the year. We’re hoping that we’ll have even more blooms from these irises during years with more rain. The drought has been hard on just about everything.
One other thing about this iris. Betsy thinks we should change the name from Queen Dorothy to Queen Betsy. What do you think?
Autumn Buglar Iris, Fairfield Glade, Tennessee. September 4, 2008.
I’ve talked about the ‘joys’ of gardening several times — there always seems to be something that needs to be done. Today I had to mow the leaves on the lower side of the house. It’s been so dry here this year that the leaves are falling off the trees and it’s only early September! We usually have some beautiful autumn color in October, but I don’t know if we’ll have many leaves left on the trees by then!!
But in spite of the work and aggravations there are many joys to working in the yard and garden. I’ve read that it’s good exercise to work in the garden and the aches and pains I sometimes feel cause me to agree with that.
But as I said there are many joys. Our roses are starting to put on a beautiful autumn display now that the weather is a little cooler. And the picture above shows another joy. The first of our reblooming iris bloomed yesterday. We have many iris that bloom in the spring and we enjoy them immensely. But some of our iris bloom again in the fall, giving us one more display of color to enjoy in the yard. They help make all the work worthwhile!
Senior Moments 