Mohr Medal 2018

The American Iris Society

Announces

THE WILLIAM A. MOHR MEDAL

‘SRI LANKA’

'Sri Lanka'--image by Jeanette Graham

‘SRI LANKA’ (T.Johnson ‘10). Sri Lanka has many excellent traits including strong growth and clumps loaded with stalks having 2 branches and up to 6 buds. White standards have prominent, strong gold midribs and edges that curl back slightly to reveal yellow styles. Slightly recurved light greenish yellow falls have diffuse mid gold spots encircling soft yellow to tangerine beards.

This medal is restricted to irises of one-quarter or more aril content that do not meet the more restrictive requirements of the Clarence G. White Medal.

It is named in honor of William A. Mohr (1871-1923). About ten years before his death, Mohr began working with irises. He obtained the tetraploid Asiatic species, as well as regelia and oncocyclus irises, and communicated with other iris hybridizers such as Ellen Sturtevant and Samuel Stillman Berry. The two greatest achievements of William Mohr's hybridizing programs are probably his plicatas and his innovative and beautiful arilbreds. His great plicatas are `Los Angeles' and the iris that won the first American Dykes Medal, `San Francisco.' Mohr's most important arilbred iris is the magnificent `William Mohr.'

The World of Irises blog will be posting once a day all of the medal winners. The entire list of winners can be found at http://irises.org/About_Irises/Awards_Surveys/AIS_Awards.html, the AIS Encyclopedia and later in the AIS Bulletin, IRISES. Pictures can be found at http://wiki.irises.org/Main/InfoAwards2018.

'Egyptian Queen' takes the 2013 William Mohr Medal

by Jim Murrain

I am thrilled to announce the winner of the 2013 William Mohr Medal is 
Tom Johnson of Oregon for his 'Egyptian Queen'.

Photo by   Tom Johnson

Here is the description from the Iris Encyclopedia.

'Egyptian Queen' OGB- (Thomas Johnson, R. 2007). Sdlg. #TU289C. AB, 20” (51 cm), M. S. medium lilac, rosy copper midribs, fine network of veins overall; style arms tan copper, large; F. riose copper blending to tan copper; muted gold hafts; velvety black cherry signals; beards bright yellow, slight fragrance. 'Hot Jazz' X 'Onlooker'. Sib to 'Octave'. Mid-America Garden, 2007. Honorable Mention 2009; Award of Merit 2011. 

This is Tom's second win two years running. He won in 2012 for his Iris 'Suspect'. Many thanks to Tom Johnson for bringing us another easy to grow Arilbred Iris with the exotic look of the desert irises of the Middle East. As an OGB- this is over half bearded Iris heritage ensuring that it will prosper in many diverse climates.

For information about this award go here.

For more information about Aril and Arilbred irises please visit the Aril Society International website    and consider joining this vibrant group of Iris lovers.