Saturday, August 1, 2009

Jim Johnson's Bearded Irises


Today in Vestal was the annual Vestal Friends of the Library Book Sale/ Iris Society Sale/Farmers Market/Flea Market/Bake Sale. What a zoo! It's bad enough parking wise when it is just the Farmers Market. We got there an hour after it opened and (as usual) there was almost no parking. With great restraint I ignored the library book sale and went instead straight to the iris sale.

We have several types of irises at the house. They have multiplied throughout the years. The two types we started with were both tall bearded irises, fragrant, one a light purple, smelling just like grape kool-aid. Then there was a purple bi-color, also with a scent. The "kool-aid irises" I got from a then-co worker (if I have to name names it was the mother of Baltimore Orioles pitcher Jim Johnson - does that mean I can auction them off on e-Bay as being related to a celebrity?) who gave them to me from the surplus of her flower beds.

I have no idea what the real names of these are, so I will informally call the all-purple ones "Jim Johnson" (not to be confused with the Jimmy Johnson of NASCAR. The picture above is of those irises.

This is a picture of the bi colored fragrant irises we were also given. I can't remember if it was from her or another friend from work.






Two years ago we went to this same Iris sale and got several irises - a couple bloomed last year (yellow) and one bloomed this year (wonderful white) - but none of them were as tall as the varieties we already had. This year, we got one each of the following: you have got to love the names. These should be as tall as the ones we already have.
Some of the names are self-explanatory.
Coffee Malt ("apricot with a dash of coffee")
Hollywood Nights
Hello Darkness
Celebration Song (this is apricot pink standard with blue-lavender falls)
Immortality (pure white self w. lemon beards) this one is supposed to be a re bloomer

As "bonuses" we got a couple of short ones for free
Apricot Drops
Ozark evening

Hopefully these will tie our collection together. Maybe next year I'll have some more pictures to share.

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