2012 Knowlton Medal Winner 'Crow's Feet'

By Andi Rivarola

We are happy to announce the winner of the 2012 Knowlton Medal: 'Crow's Feet,' hybridized by Paul Black of Oregon.

A complete list of winners in other categories will be announced soon.

Here's a full description of this beautiful iris via the Iris Wiki:

'Crow's Feet' (Paul Black, registered 2006). Sdlg. K187A. BB, 27" (69 cm), EM,Standards and style arms white, style crests edged peach; Falls are white, lined with closely spaced purple veins from beard to edge, outer quarter sanded purple between veins, narrow white rim 2/3 way around upper part on each side, outer edge of haft veined medium peach-plum; beards white tipped orange; ruffled; slight musky fragrance. G33A: (B139D, 'Color My World' sib, x Taunt) X 'Snowed In'. Mid-America 2006. Honorable Mention 2008; Ben Hager Cup 2008; Award of Merit 2010.

Border Beardeds are essentially small versions of the TBs.  They are in the same height range and bloom size as the intermediates, but bloom with the tall beardeds. Good BBs have round, ruffled petals that complement their small size. The highest award for this class is the Knowlton Medal.

Knowlton Medal

The highest award given by the American Iris Society strictly to Border Bearded Irises.

History by Clarence Mahan

This medal is restricted to border bearded (BB) irises. It is named in honor of Harold W. Knowlton (1888-1968).

Harold Knowlton of Auburndale, Massachusetts, was a tireless promoter of the border bearded class of irises. Bennett Jones wrote in The World of Irises: "Harold Knowlton was among the first to make deliberate selections of smaller plants. Two of his 1950 introductions, 'Pearl Cup' ... and 'Cricket'... display the desirable features we still seek in modern border irises."

Knowlton was the seventh president of the AIS (1953-55) and served the society in several important positions. He was highly regarded as a leader, planner and organizer and reorganized the AIS awards system and instituted the first Handbook for Judges and the handbook for new members; What Every Iris Grower Should Know. He also compiled and edited the 1959 Check List. The AIS awarded him the Distinguished Service Medal in 1955.

More on the Knowlton Medal, such as its history and past medal winners, can be found on the Iris Wiki.

For more information on AIS Awards, please visit our website.

Heavenly Hager Irises

Late at night, after I kiss my dear husband goodnight, I sneak out of our bedroom, pad down the hall, and turn on the computer in my study.  I spend hours on the internet chasing my next fix:  beautiful photographs of irises.  I search garden blogs, Facebook pages, garden forums, and commercial iris grower catalogs.  I assemble dream gardens and wish lists.

I expected to grow weary of this obsession within a few months and to move on, perhaps to something more respectable like playing Resident Evil 5.  I was mistaken, and my nightly sojourns only leave me wanting more.  Occasionally I find a photograph that is so beautiful that I must share.  My husband Mike is a good sport, and will give an animated nod of appreciation when I call him in to look at an especially pretty iris, but to tell the truth, from the glazed appearance of his eyes, I suspect the Nairobi Trio is playing in his head.


When I saw Barbara Kuhlman's photograph of Ben Hager's iris 'Edith Wolford' on Gardenweb, I knew I couldn't limit my sharing to Mikey.  I had to share it with all of you.

After a night spent with this photo, I recalled another lovely picture of 'Edith Wolford' and decided on the theme 'heavenly Hager irises.'  I was smitten with this enchanting photo by Laurawege on Dave's Garden quite some time ago.  Here the geraniums and delphiniums make perfect companions, and have me fantasizing about a new lavendar-blue and yellow bed in my garden.  

All of Joel Shaber's photographs of his Idaho garden are worth staying up into the wee hours to view, but his images of 'Edith Wolford' are particularly lovely.  These photos show why this iris won the highest honor for an iris, the Dykes Medal, in 1993.

The word 'clump' seems unsuited to describe such beauty.

'Edith Wolford' blooms midseason and is a tall iris, reaching 40 inches.










Susanne Holland Spicker grows irises in her brilliantly coordinated and charming Utah garden.  She feeds the iris addiction with her exceptional photography in her blog, Sowing the Seeds, a great site for late-night iris ogling.  Here she has captured the beauty of Hager's 'Poem of Ecstacy' which she grows with 'Jump For Joy.'

'Poem of Ecstacy' was the winner of the John C. Wister Memorial Medal for tall bearded irises in 2004.  Here it is paired with tall lupines in Susanne's garden, demonstrating her talent combining plants with different forms and coordinating colors.

'Poem of Ecstacy' grows to be about 36" tall and blooms midseason.














'Beverly Sills' is Ben Hager's most famous iris, with consistently high ratings in the American Iris Society's popularity polls.  It was the 1985 winner of the Dykes Medal, and is named after the famous opera singer.  It does her justice.

This iris is easy to grow in Southern California and makes a satisfying clump in a short period of time.  It has quite an extended bloom season in cool weather here.  Last year it was blooming from late April through June.

'Beverly Sills' is a pale, warm pink.  It is a photogenic iris, and has the wide falls that Ben Hager is so famous for creating.

This is 'Beverly Sills' with 'Lady Friend.' 

















'Chasing Rainbows'  is a 1998 Hager introduction.  Naomi DiVincenzo, an avid gardener who has just won her first blue ribbon for iris horticulture, grows a lovely clump on her grounds, Front Range Iris, in Colorado.  You can see how she brought home the blue from this photo.

One of my regular stops during my nighttime forays on the internet is the archive of the American Iris Society's annual Photo Contest.  This is why:

This photo of 'Chasing Rainbows' by Becky Fain, the proprietor of the Inn at Iris Meadows in North Carolina, won first prize and appeared on the cover of the AIS magazine.  I wanted to make sure that those of you new to growing irises got to see it too.


The American Iris Society Photography Contest is a wonderful way to share your irises, your garden, and your photography with other iris lovers.  The deadline this year is June 30, so if you love taking pictures of your irises, please consider entering.  We have many long nights ahead in front of the computer, and we need more beautiful photos!

What's Happening in Luminata and Plicata Irises?

First, I want to confess my ignorance in the various new classes that are developing in plicata breeding. Sure I know what a plicata iris pattern is and I am fairly sure I know what a luminata is. After that, it begins to get fuzzy. I am getting old and you young guys and gals need to cut me some slack. You will be here some day too.

About 5 or 6 years ago, I decided that plicatas were very overlooked and I wanted to start some new crosses along those lines. I set aside a couple of special guest beds and acquired a lot of named plicatas. Some of these were from the 80s and 90s and I didn't know of the exact patterns that were represented in these varieties in the 2000s. I started my crosses and I was quite pleased with my early results. There was a new line developing as these crosses were made. Luminatas started showing up regularly. I got interested in these and started making luminata crosses. I soon learned that some parents were good for adding form to the luminata crosses, even if they were regular plicatas.

I have had what I think is very good success with my plicata crosses, and I see some very good new seedlings on the horizon that I think will be quite different than what is out there. I wanted to share two these luminata seedlings with you and see what you think. Both crosses involve a luminata on one side and regular plicata on the other side. If they aren't luminatas, just let me know and I will be happy to call a spade a spade. At any rate, things are happening in plicatas. Watch for the next wave of new things.

Thank you for listening.

Respectfully,
Jim Hedgecock

Comanche Acres Iris Gardens

Whoa...Back Up...Where Did Median Iris Come From?

After I posted my last blog about Median Iris titled "Medians-Who Hybridized The Little Beauties" I received a comment from a wonderful irisarian that reminded me I did not start at the beginning of the life of Medians. I fully intended to introduce everyone to the Median hybridizers who were honored with the Bennet C. Jones Award for Median Hybridzing Excellence, beginning with the first recipient and namesake of the award. But first I am going to backtrack and start with the pioneering hybridizers of the Median Iris. Then, I will introduce the award for the best intermediate iris and the men it is named for. Finally, I will show you photos of some of the award winners.

Much of the earliest hybridizing work was done by Foster and Dykes (UK) in the latter part of the 19th century, with crosses being made between tall and dwarf species. In 1898, William John Caparne from Guernsey, off the coast of Normandy, started selling what he called a "New Race of Irises (Intermediates)". Due to his good natured sharing, other nurserymen both in America and the UK further developed his introductions as their own. Caparne’s achievements were eclipsed to the point where even his original creation of the Intermediate hybrids became obscured. Caparne continued to develop his 'Intermediate' irises well into the mid 1930s. Then in the U.S. the Sass brothers, Grace Sturtevan, and others produced intermediates, and the Sass brothers crossed I. pumila with tetraploid tall bearded irises. With continued work came what we now call standard dwarf bearded irises that were fertile. Thus the early development of Median Iris was well on its way.

Jacob Sass

Hans (1868-1949) and Jacob (1872-1945) Sass were born in Alt Duvenstedt, Germany and immigrated to the United States with their parents in 1884. They settled on a farm in Nebraska, and were interested in breeding garden flowers at an early age. They bred irises, peonies, daylilies, lilacs, gladiolus, lilies and other garden plants. When they became charter members of The American Iris Society, they had bred irises for more than a decade. The two brothers were very close and shared ideas on hybridizing as well as seedling pollen. Their irises won many awards and are to be found throughout the pedigrees of nearly all the modern tall bearded irises in our gardens. But their early fame as hybridizers came for their work producing intermediate bearded irises. They were among the first to cross iris pumila with tall bearded iris, producing the true intermediates.  Crossing dwarf irises with tall bearded irises, they were the first American breeders to develop many new colors and forms in the intermediate class. They saw the great advantage of intermediate bearded irises on the windy prairie, and the value of a type of iris that filled out the bloom season between the early dwarf irises and the later tall bearded irises. Hans was the first to introduce a reblooming intermediate iris 'Autumn Queen', in 1926.

Hans P Sass 1950

In 1966 The American Iris Society awarded the first Hans and Jacob Sass Medal. This medal is restricted to intermediate bearded (IB) irises. The IBs are 16-27” tall with flowers that are 3½"-5" wide. The IBs fit both in size and bloom time between the SDBs and the TBs. The Hans and Jacob Sass Medals are provided by the Median Iris Society and named in honor of Hans Sass (1868-1949) and Jacob Sass (1872-1945). Below are several photos of Sass Medal winners, the year they won the award, their hybridizer and hometown.

1962 'Blue Asterisk' Wilma Greenlee Chrisman IL

1995 'Blue Eyed Blond' Allan Ensminger Lincoln NE

1965 'Cutie' Schreiner Salem OR

2004 'Gnu Rayz' Brad Kasperek Elwood UT

1997 'Hot Spice' Terry Aitken Vancouver WA

1970 'Drummer Boy' Schreiner Salem OR

2010 'Ruby Slippers' Keith Keppel Salem OR

1982 'Pink Kitten' Vernon Wood Pinole CA

2006 'Midsummer Night’s Dream' Lowell Baumunk Littleton CO

1961 Award 1968 Medal 'Moonchild' Tom Craig Escondido CA

1988 'Oklahoma Bandit' Hooker Nichols Dallas TX

2005 'Starwoman' Marky Smith Yakima WA (Won the Dykes in 2008)

1996 'Lemon Pop' Larry Lauer Wilton CA

AIS Digital Programs

For an interesting and educational meeting, a Digital Program may satisfy and stimulate your garden club or chapter’s interest in all types of irises.

Pre-orders are being taken for the April 2012 American Iris Society Convention that was held in Ontario, California. It will show the various gardens and irises that were blooming at the time.

'Living on the Edge' (L. Lauer 2009)

It will be available for purchase soon.  They are $15.00 each, which includes postage ($25.00 for international orders).

To get on the list contact:
AIS Digital Programs and Slides Coordinator,
Janet Smith, PO Box 1585, Coarsegold, CA 93614-1585
(559) 683-0447 (Home and FAX line) E-mail: aisslides@irises.org

The Huntington Library & Gardens, San Marino, CA

Slide and Digital Programs: This is a service for AIS affiliated iris clubs/societies providing presentation programs; the purpose is to help these groups supplement their activity programs in an economical way and to provide them with tools to use for garden club and other flower organization programs. There is an assortment of program titles available and these continually evolve and change. (See listing provided at the AIS website for the currently available presentation programs.) 

Please visit our website, for more information on The American Iris Society Presentations.

LA Irises Blooming in Northwest Louisiana

Bloom season in Northwest LA is about over for another year.  We were about three weeks early with bloom this year which made for an interesting bloom season.  Bloom season usually starts with Dutch irises and daffodils followed by iris.virginica and then Tall Bearded irises. As the season progresses, the LA iris early bloomers will begin to pop out.  This year we had all the above blooming at the same time and even some day-lilies!  So this year we had a quick and short bloom season.  Toward the end of the season (third week of April -- which should normally be second week of May) we had early bloomers, mid bloomer and late bloomers all blooming together.  The unusually early bloom season did have one reward -- we had some late bloomers in our annual iris show and it was a refreshing change to see some of those irises win awards!

LA iris 'Adell Tingle' (Hutchins, B 2006)

 'Adell Tingle' was named for my aunt.  She is a self-taught wildflower expert and wrote a column on wildflowers and country living for a Bienville Parish, LA newspaper. Auntie A has more knowledge of plants than I could ever hope to absorb.  I wish I could download her brain into my brain like copying a hard disk drive.

'Atchafalaya' (Campbell, F 1998)

 'Atchafalaya' was named for the Atchafalaya (Ugh chaf a lie ugh) basis in south LA where many LA irises once grew.  Unfortunately this native habitat of LA irises has been heavily damaged by recent hurricanes, canals built by oil companies and urban sprawl by surrounding cities.

'Bayou Tiger' (Strawn, K 1993)

 'Bayou Tiger' is a great garden iris with beautiful LSU colors.  It continues to be one of my favorites.

'Bound for Glory' (Pryor, H 1999)

 'Bound for Glory' is shown growing next to some really big and tall poppies.  We obtained the seeds for these poppies from the late Marie Caillet, a charter member of the Society for Louisiana Irises.  They grow with the irises and since they "self seed", they now grow throughout most of the property.

'Chacahoula Fire' (McSparrin, R 2005)

 'Chacahoula Fire' was probably named for Chacahoula, LA, a south LA town with a really interesting background. This pretty iris with distinctive signals surrounded by red is an eye catcher in anyone's garden.

'Extra Dazzle' (Pryor, H 2003)

 'Extra Dazzle' has a lot going on!  First, it has signals on all the petals. On LA irises usually the signal is located where the "beard" is located on Tall Bearded irises and normally the signal is only found on the falls. It also has a white "halo" around all the petals and a lot of veining.  I would say the iris is properly named and will dazzle anyone who grows it.

There is much discussion among iris growers about the difficulty of growing LA irises.  I have found that LA irises will pretty much grow anywhere I plant them.  Then again, I live in LA, the home of LA irises.  We have recently planted some LA irises with other plants and the following pictures will show that they do in fact grow well with other plants.  Don't plant them with your cacti, they will not be happy.  But most other plants will grow with LA irises.

LA irises growing with other plants to include hostas

LA irises growing around a small pond with Caddo Lake and bald cypress trees in background

I just had to post this picture of our "rock pond" which has a large limestone rock in the middle.  I tried to dig it up with a backhoe but it was simply too large.  So, I just dug a pond around it.  Historic Caddo Lake, shared between northwest LA and northeast TX, is seen in the background with bald cypress trees growing in the water.  The northern part of the lake has Spanish moss on all the trees but for some reason the open part of the lake near us has very little Spanish moss.

LA irises growing with "hardy" gladiolas and poppies

Time to wrap it up for this session but I'll be back soon with more pictures and stories of the official wildflower of the State of LA. The great State of LA celebrated its 200 year birthday on Monday (April 30th, 2012)!

Double Crossed

During the winter the hybridizer does not hibernate.  He plans.  (So does she.)  Reviewing his goals, assessing their degree of achievement, noting successes, targets missed, failed crosses to be attempted again, he begins to identify the new candidates, scrutinizing their pedigrees, looking for relationships and desired traits and, finally, lists the crosses to be made in some order of priority.  This last is most important, because, when he steps into the garden, he will be surrounded by beauties saying, "Cross me, cross me!"  And any number of likely suitors may be at hand.  It is at this point, if the hybridizer lacks sterling resolve, that the winter's work may go down the drain.

But our hybridizer resists the siren song and marches steadily toward the location of The Plan's cross No. 1, which is . . . where?  There's no bloom.  There's no bloomstalk! The damned thing isn't going to bloom!  Aaargh!  Cross No.1 and several others that were to be made with the same cultivar go off the list.  But our hybridizer has a backup  --  Plan B.  Elsewhere in the garden is a parent of the slacker, also an Award of Merit winner and possessing essentially the same qualities as its progeny.  Though not the ideal, it will do as a substitute.

"Cross me, cross me!", the flowers sing seductively as he passes among them, but he ignores their plaints and forges resolutely ahead to the location of the parent.

I need not inflict on the reader the hybridizer's reaction on finding that the parent isn't blooming either.

Two Award of Merit winners, parent and offspring, long established in the garden, fed and cared for as all the others,yet not blooming, while the rest of the garden blossoms merrily along.  It bolsters my suspicion that there is a genetic code in irises, of which we are ignorant, that governs bloom, germination and maybe other aspects of their growth regardless of weather and general growing conditions.

Despite the failure of Plans A and B, the rest of the list goes well, providing opportunity to appreciate the maturing of various seedlings and even start some new lines.  In fact, just as the hybridizer was singing the blues about the missing prime crosses, which were in the red spectrum, his attention was drawn not to just one, but to several newly maturing blues and blue/blacks.

This is 05B11, (Titan's Glory, Holy Night, Sweeter Than Wine) X Ranks of Blue.  It has taken a while to mature, but is ready to go.

 

Next is 072022 (Stealth Fighter X Ranks of Blue), also ready,

And a passel of their relatives slated for further breeding, including sibling 072O21,

072O19, also a sibling,

and several of their sisters and their cousins and their aunts, including 962N1,

which would be a bit of "back to the future" engineering, but wouldn't it be nice to have a reblooming "black" amoena?

To further relieve his frustration at the demise of Plan A, the visiting president of another AIS chapter points out a seedling to which the hybridizer hasn't paid enough attention.  It's 064C10 ((Margarita x Momauguin) x Best Bet) X Ranks of Blue, on the purple side of blue and smelling like a chocolate factory!

Now for the hard part  --  finding a name!

And even though he thinks a genetic code is responsible for prime targets A and B not blooming, our hybridizer is going to move them, just in case.

--  Griff Crump

IRISES Spring Issue

If you can't wait to read and look at the exciting iris pictures on every issue of IRISES, well you don't have to wait much longer. Here's the cover of the spring issue of IRISES, the Bulletin of The American Iris Society.

As you know, IRISES is published quarterly and sent to members of the AIS via either printed format or shared with e-members via a digital reader. So, now no matter where you live in the world you can enjoy perusing this magnificent magazine cover to cover as soon as it's released.  To find out how easy it is to become a member of The American Iris Society, click here.

The featured articles in this issue of IRISES include:

• My Favorite Irises: by Jim Hedgecock, Missouri (front cover is a clue)
• Selling Irises at the Farmers Market: by Pat McNeal, Maryland
• Basic Bearded Iris Pests and Deceases: by Editor Kelley D. Norris, Iowa
• An Iris Dream: by Naomi DiVincenzo, Colorado
• The Genetic Domain on TB irises: by Dan H. Meckenston, Kansas
• The Quest for Orange: by Heather Pryor, Australia
• Illumination: by Keith Keppel, Oregon
• 2012 Photo Contest Rules

And some of the regular sections are:

• Section Happenings
• Milestones
• Youth Views
• In Your Backyard
• Photographing Irises
• Convention Information

We hope you will receive this issue of IRISES in the next couple of weeks, and or check The American Iris Society website to find out if the electronic copy has been posted.

We appreciate your support, and hope to see you at the National Convention to be held in Ontario, California on April 16 - 21.