{"id":3315,"date":"2021-02-08T06:40:45","date_gmt":"2021-02-08T14:40:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/?p=3315"},"modified":"2021-02-08T06:40:45","modified_gmt":"2021-02-08T14:40:45","slug":"scented-iris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/scented-iris\/","title":{"rendered":"Scented Iris"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"iris\"<\/a>We are a long way from the ancient Greeks, but their gods and mythological heroes are still with us in many plant names.\u00a0 One of the loveliest ancient deities in our gardens is Iris, goddess of the rainbow, whose namesake flowers stand tall each spring.<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t think of an ugly iris, but I am especially drawn to the tall bearded varieties that are descended from Iris germanica.\u00a0 Like the goddess, the species originated in the Mediterranean region.\u00a0 It has spread around the world, escaping cultivation and even naturalizing in some places.<\/p>\n

But Iris germanica did not escape plant breeders, who have produced cultivated varieties in every color of the rainbow, not to mention sizes ranging from quite tall\u2014up to 38 inches\u2014to dwarfs that stand eight inches tall or sometimes even less.\u00a0 All sprout from the fleshy roots called rhizomes, bearing sword-shaped leaves and showy flower that are distinguished by \u201cbeards\u201d.\u00a0 These are actually patches of fine, hairs that adorn the central \u201cfalls\u201d or downward-facing petals and often contrast with the main flower colors.<\/p>\n

Most of us know a bearded iris when we see one, but how many of us have given any thought to the scent of those gorgeous flowers?\u00a0 In the garden of my childhood home, my father grew a patch of pale blue bearded iris.\u00a0 They were lovely to look at, but their sweet scent was so pronounced that people commented on it.\u00a0 I have never found a variety quite like it, though I suspect that it might have originated in the nineteen twenties, around the time the house was built.\u00a0 Hundreds of iris varieties are commercially available now, but that one may well have been superseded by more recent cultivars.<\/p>\n

I went on a search for bearded iris with strong scents and found that many varieties exude what vendors describe as \u201cslight, sweet fragrance\u201d, or just \u201csweet fragrance\u201d.\u00a0 Many fewer bearded iris are described as having \u201cpronounced fragrance\u201d.\u00a0 When strong fragrance is present in a particular variety, it may be spicy, musky, fruity, or sweet.\u00a0 In fact, scientific papers have been written on the various chemical components responsible for iris fragrance.\u00a0 Suffice it to say that there are many.<\/p>\n

I went on a hunt for especially fragrant iris varieties, hoping to find a pale blue one with pronounced fragrance.\u00a0 Catalog vendors like Schreiner\u2019s Iris Gardens and Gardenia.net allow customers to search specifically for fragrance, but the results include many iris that have only \u201cslight sweet scent\u201d.\u00a0 Clearly a bit of digging is necessary to get to the most fragrant varieties.<\/p>\n

I found one promising iris, \u2018Sugar Blues\u2019, with medium blue standards\u2014the upright petals\u2014and falls, coupled with white beards.\u00a0 The fragrance is listed as \u201cpronounced\u201d.\u00a0 \u2018Sugar Blues\u2019 is also a rebloomer, flowering in spring and again in fall, a trait that marks the variety as fairly recent in origin.\u00a0 The iris I remember from my childhood was a paler shade of blue, with orangish beards, so clearly \u2018Sugar Blues\u2019 is not an exact match with the plants that I remember.<\/p>\n

\u2018Absolute Treasure\u2019 is closer in color to what I remember, and is the right size.\u00a0 The catalog copy describes it as \u201ca tall fragrant knockout\u201d.\u00a0 It is not clear whether \u201cknockout\u201d refers to the color or the fragrance.\u00a0 It was introduced in 2006, so it is not the iris of my childhood, but might make a good substitute.<\/p>\n

I made one last stop on my fragrant blue iris journey and that was at the American Iris Society, which maintains a registry of iris in commerce.\u00a0 Each year the Society also awards its Dykes Medal to one variety for overall appearance, hardiness and quality.\u00a0 Since the inception of the award in the 1930\u2019s several blues have been honored, but the superlative-laden blurbs do not mention fragrance.<\/p>\n

Since both \u2018Sugar Blues\u2019 and \u2018Absolute Treasure\u2019 come close to my iris of memory, I may order one of each to see which has the best fragrance.\u00a0 Even if neither is quite right, I will have gained two beautiful varieties.<\/p>\n

And just maybe the bees will do their marvelous work, cross-pollinating my two blue newcomers and producing an offspring quite like that long ago fragrant blue iris.\u00a0 Stranger things have happened in my garden.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We are a long way from the ancient Greeks, but their gods and mythological heroes are still with us in many plant names.\u00a0 One of the loveliest ancient deities in our gardens is Iris, goddess of the rainbow, whose namesake flowers stand tall each spring. I can\u2019t think of an ugly iris, but I am … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,2,3],"tags":[1946,2457,2456,2453,2454,817,2455,1945],"class_list":["post-3315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall","category-general-interest","category-spring","category-summer","tag-bearded-iris","tag-blue-iris","tag-fragrant-iris","tag-german-iris","tag-iridaceae-family","tag-old-fashioned-flowers","tag-scented-iris","tag-tall-iris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3315"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3315\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3317,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3315\/revisions\/3317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gardenersapprentice.com\/gardeningtips\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}