Last weekend, I visited a good friend who has a well-established garden with California natives, roses, and some rare plants. She had lured me with the promise of irises.
We admired her garden, had some tea and very excellent persimmon bread, and then she dug out generous helpings of three different kinds of irises for me to take home.
We admired her garden, had some tea and very excellent persimmon bread, and then she dug out generous helpings of three different kinds of irises for me to take home.
Two were Pacific Coast hybrid irises; one will bloom dark blue, the other a rosy lavender. The other is called Iris innominata, and reading the Wikipedia article, I see it's actually a rare Iris. Innominata is a smallish Iris and I planted it in pots where it will have good drainage and some water and I hope it will be happy.
For each plant, my friend had included a good amount of root. I'm hopeful those root will grow strong over the rest of the rainy season. I planted my Iris in part shade or bright shade. Native Iris are woodland plants and don't do well in full sun.
Now I'm just hoping a few of them will flower this spring. But if not, they'll be the gift for next winter.
The other wonderful gift this winter has been the many visits we've had from birds. They often start at the Liquidambar in the front garden, where they stop for a snack of seeds or just hang out. Our garden, with its berries and seeds and the different bird baths, is usually the one garden where all the birds congregate in winter. It's also the one garden where crickets are serenading passers by in summer. I feel so fortunate to have all those special visitors.
We have lots of finches, both gold finches and house finches. Also a western tanager, phoebes, chickadees, wrens, towhees, jays, and song sparrows. The birds often come to the bird baths I gave near the living room window. The finches love the handing bath, larger baths prefer the saucer with sand. They all are very camera shy and I so admire my fellow bloggers who manage good bird photos.
On Christmas Day, I saw a whole flock of birds I'd never seen before. "What are those?" I asked Mr. Mouse. "Maybe Cedar waxwings?" he replied. I looked it up in the book, and he was right. Cedar waxwings. What a great Christmas gift, the surprise of an unknown bird!
There's just one thing.... We'd better stop parking under the tree (this is a gift we can do without).
Comments
Also, congrats on creating such a welcoming habitat garden- it must be better than television to watch them out there!
Frances
Those irises are really sweet! We have over 200 sq ft of Dwarf Crested Iris in our woods. See Cedar Waxwings on Christmas was a special gift! Next time maybe you'll see them pass food to one another.