Irises

My friend, the "Iris Queen", "Iris Maven",  or  "Iris Obsessed," has several varieties of Irises on her property.  I have been trying to take pictures so she can see that her irises are doing well; I'm also trying to prove that I'm a "good enough plant mom" that she can give me some of her babies when I get my own property and rest easy that the babies will be well cared for.

This year, I took over 30 pictures of her irises; it was difficult to chose which ones to show but I have narrowed it down to about 17.  Yes, I will have multiple blogs with iris pictures- this is really the only way to do this.

First up, Oriental (Japanese?) Iris: my friend said these are hard to transplant as they are very particular and I decided to start with them since she has not seen them bloom.

Do yuu see the sphecid wasp in the stem?  I didn't know it was there until after I took the picture.  I'm just glad it didn't try to sting me since I'm allergic to hymenoptera stings.

Can you see the pentamid bug curled up the bottom petal?  I tried to get a better picture but it kept curling back up in the petal.

This is what I call the purple striped iris.

It is my understanding that this is supposed to be the same as the one above but it looks more blue than purple and the beard (fuzzy, caterpillar looking section on the petal) is a lighter, much lighter yellow.

Group of irises out in the "triangle" on the other side of the driveway.