That takes care of a little spare time

[johnridley]

The woman at work that I got dahlia tubers from a couple of years ago just came in with about 20 bags of sorted iris rhizomes. She's no more organized or diligent in the garden than I am, but she has a master gardener neighbor who is always trying to unload excess.

I'm thinking next year I'm going to give up on most of the vegetable garden since most of the output there goes uneaten anyway, and plant flowers instead, so that takes care of a place to put these. I do have to get them in the ground FAST though - they've been in her trunk since Sunday and are already drying out. I should at least mist them and get them into a pot of peat moss if nothing else.

I almost didn't take any since I'm such a negligent gardener that I felt I didn't deserve them, but she has a huge amount and just wants to get rid of them.

Thankfully it's nowhere near time to dig up the dahlias yet, though I should check on the glads. I have been exceedingly bad and haven't even visited that garden for weeks. I walked by and had to endure the dahlias, un-deadheaded for a month, dried up blooms hanging there while a few live blooms looked at me accusingly.

And the strawberry patch isn't even visible for all the weeds. I spent over two hours there a week ago and barely made it passable down the center; I don't think I properly cleared even one plant out of dozens. At this point it will probably take me an entire weekend to weed that 30 feet.

Comments

[norfacoflandra.livejournal.com]

Don't worry. Iris rizomes can dry out considerably. They're very similar to bulbs that way.

Important tip: With iris, beware of iris borer. Trim any remaining greenery VERY close to the rizome, and throw it away. Don't compost it. Then plant them, and make sure there's no suspicious holes holding late grubs.

One contaminated iris caused me to have to dig the entire bed out and carefully decontaminate. The moths lay eggs in the leaves, and the eggs evidently can winter over in small bits of leftover foliage.

The strawberries: Dig out enough plants, and start from scratch with the bed. If it's that bad, it'll be less work that way. Although it may be too late to transplant strawberries.

[johnridley.livejournal.com]

Thanks, I have no experience with iris so that's good info.

I've given up on transplanting strawberries for the year, I'm just going to clear the new rows and till the prior bed for transplanting next year after they're done bearing.