everyone should plant dwarf irises.

Of all the bulbs that I purchased as part of my post-trip retail therapy, the dwarf irises have been the most enthusiastic. The one in this first picture opened up the first week of February! This is all the more remarkable because none of the bulbs got into the ground until December.

Knowing that I finally had a yard to garden in after so long without one, I spent a significant amount of time everyday looking through the one bulb catalog that I had with me (from John Scheepers, Inc.). After weeks at sea, being frequently pulled out from where it was wedged under the edge of the mattress with whatever novel I was reading at the time to be furtively thumbed through as I imagined the fantasy garden I would plant when I got home, its tattered state is more what you would expect a 12 year-old's secret porno mag to look like than a bulb catalog. But I suppose for people who get excited about gardening, bulb and seed catalogs are porn: visual aids to stimulate fantasies and feed our imagination until we can act upon the desires in real life. When I finally got off the boat, it was already the end of November and most places had sold out of quite a few varieties. I did find one place that still had a great selection and everything was 50% off, so I ended up spending $300 at Brent and Becky's Bulbs. The sad thing is that this represented me cutting back on what I wanted to get.

I went in for bulk thing and stuff that would potentially naturalize. I didn't want to make clean beds and patterns and rows. I wanting things popping up all over the place. And now it is. Ben complains (rightfully so) that I didn't really plan a clear path into the side yard where I planted things most heavily. There is sort of a method to the madness, but at the moment things are only just beginning to show their face. Once they are taller it will be easier to avoid stepping on things, but until then it is hard to guess quite where things will start poking out of the ground. The dwarf irises were the earliest warnings of where not to step.

There had been all kinds of different specific varieties of dwarf iris that I had planned on getting, but in the end I just bought a bag of 100 mixed bulbs. I threw a few in here and there with other bulbs until they were in every slightly sunny corner of the yard. Because they are so small, you had to look out for them and enjoying their scent meant getting down on all fours and putting you face almost to the ground (the tiny yellow Iris danfordiae had the most intoxicating scent). They didn't all explode at once, but instead one would pop up here and then another over there. It wasn't a solid patch of color, but rather little gems tucked here and there. You could usually only see a few at a time in any particular spot, but one day I walked around and counted at least 25 all blooming at once in their various corners of the yard.

I totally recommend tucking a few of these into any garden.

After the jump you can see a sampling of the variety of them. The picture at the top is the most recent, still in bloom as I type, and they go backward in time as you go down...