Who All Is Going to AIS this year?

Will do.

greenville you say? that's within driving distance. Maybe I'll look at that one instead, or the one in the 4th region.

bonjon- if you go let me know, I am trying to get everyone from Daves that is going together for a group pic.

Happy Sunday, BIF's!! Since we have more people visiting our thread, I thought we might have more going to KC!

I'd forgotten to answer irisMA's question. I'm northside in Raleigh, small rolling hills, heavy red clay, heavy forest. Southside is flater, sandy soil, like coastal plain, lots of fields. it's a mix.

Tony Avent (southside) told us climate zone line went diagonally through town, 7A north, 7B south. Then I saw in the paper saying the Nat. Arbor folks are rezoning us to 8, global warming and all.

well, I'm going to try for the Region 4 spring conference. I need the judge's training.

I am also going for judge's training. I actually already have enough hours but not enough years to be an apprentice, but I will be taking arilbred training in Albuquerque April 24 or 25 and then whatever I can get in Kansas City. While I am waiting to have one more year under my belt, I might as well keep training.

Extra hours=extra knowlege, which always helps.

Yup I am up already 13 hours for next year, but down next year in garden training so in 2010 will have to get that plus will be having one more JT this year that I already know about...at regional

D

This last one I learned more than I ever have at any JT before I truly believe. Great.

We all do a lot of training in the garden so that requirement is not hard. regional training is not set up as yet.

Our club is in charge of the Regional training this year, so we will have garden training at the garden maintained by our club. This will be in the August, so it will be what iris should look like in August. There is no such thing as too much judge's training. I have never had JI training but then, there haven't been any JI's where I have gone to see iris. I did get LA training in Austin. We will also get English Box training at the Region 23 Convention.

Better explain 'English Box' to those who don't know about it. Long ago when ISM had several youth members, they made out 2 boxes for us. Good hands on project.

After I have the training, I can explain it -- don't know much about it myself but we do have such entries in our show each year. Here are the instructions for building an English box. There are instructions for how to pick the flowers for them that I don't know, but I will hope to learn them at our Regional Judge's Training in August.

The flowers are your creativity; we have had colors, seedlings etc.

Here is the way to make an English Box (forgot to include link above.)

http://www.irises.org/aistoolbox/ais-toolbox-hort-display.html#4

I hope to learn how one decides what goes in each hole. I just know that there is some sort of theme.

I'm impressed with the last paragraph or two, as that is what happened to me - I had lovely blooms, but no nice stalks due to a windstorm that toppled them all, so all the terminal blooms were messed up.

Yes, it does sound handy. We have English boxes in our club and a few people use them. I never knew why. I learned something from this as well.

I've also seen them displayed in the English box, but never knew the purpose. Thank you for the explanation.

After you have the training I would love to hear anything more you have learned about it.

This message was edited Mar 24, 2009 12:48 PM

I think there is more to what goes into the box than was explained in that article, but when I heard it explained my brain was in information overload from trying to learn how to prepare my bloom stalks. I will report back here when I learn.

first time I prepped stalks for a show I got it all wrong! so I know what you mean, Pajar

HAPPY Tues. BIF's!! From our show book::Entries in the English Box category shall be all the same type(i.e. all tall bearded, all dwarf, or all intermediate) and shall be mature blossoms. A card stating the names of the varieties displayed shall be neatly presented. Unlabeled displays shall not be displayed. A. size 24x24", with no more than 5 mature blossoms. B.color of box C. No filler between blossoms. D. Visible side buds must be removed:however, the judge shall not penalize buds under blossoms if needed to keep stem erect. E. The falls of blossom shall not touch the box. Luckily for me DH grooms my stems for show!! Three years ago he left stem on Amarillo Frills to long!! Missed QOS by 2 inches!!LOL

ya'll, I don't believe it!

Randall is downstairs making my hotel and flight reservations for Kansas City! I'm going to Nationals!

who was it that said a bunch of Dgers are getting together there?

All right! Delighted to hear you are coming! Is Randall coming as well. It will be great to meet you in person, along with Nicky and many others from DG. You will not regret it for a minute.

no, he's got to work hard for the next two weeks, lots of deadlines.

he said, "you make going out to get the newspaper at first light a special experience" he refers to the best sun space for iris is around the mailbox!

Randall is obviously a sweetie.

OK, guys and girls. You will need to take a group photo and POST it so we can finally put names to faces. I know Bonita, so can pick her out...

Right now I wish I was going just to get out of the house, Going nuts (know it is a short drive Anita and Bonita) but with being sick this long and the rain, I am going stir crazier than normal...can not make crosses because of the weather and you should see the list.

Hey Anita, Rod is going to have some really sharp ones in the next couple of years.

D

Made first cross today, actually DH did it for me as I couldn't get low enough to the ground. Low enough? It was a cross for MDBs--glaciata seedling X Aurora Sea which I picked up from a friend last Sat. It just opened a flower with another to come. So it is sitting in a pot where it will be used. Not going to KC luckily as i still am recovering from infection during April.

Anyone know how well the iris are blooming in Kansas City right now? I couldn't make the AIS convention, but am going to make a quick trip to KC this week and would like to stop by Powell Gardens and/or Overland Park Arboretum to check out the iris display gardens there. In my own gardens, the medians are in full bloom, but the TB's haven't really started yet (spring came late in Nebraska). Kansas City is far enough southeast of here that maybe the TB's are blooming well?

KSBaptistia,

the irises at the convention were running about a week to 10 days behind normal prime blooming due to the prior cold weather. Sorry, I did n't take my computer with me to the Convention or I would have responded sooner.

the convention was GREAT! my first and certainly not my last. the folks from the Madison Wisconsin group, where nationals will be May 31 - June 5 next year, announced at the awards banquet that they did not put any limits on the hybridizers for guest plants, and were sent nearly 1500 guest plants. they were bubbling over with how gorgeous they expect the gardens to be!

The 2010 Convention does promise to be fun. As exhausting as I found this convention and as disappointing as some of the gardens were ( due to weather and deer, not to any failure of those who put it on.), I am still looking forward to 2010. I like that it will be later in may than this year's convention which almost coincided with the iris bloom in New Mexico. The next one will be quite a bit later than this one.
I thoroughly enjoyed meeting and chatting with bonjon and Nicki ( or NickisIris). I have always enjoyed meeting Dave's Garden folks when I actually meet them in person.
I, too, always learn a lot about irises at convention. This year I had the pleasure of meeting one of our new members, adoberose of Boise, Idaho and of sitting across the aisle from Brad and Kathy Kasperek, who introduce all those broken color irises named for animals like Baboon Bottom, Millennium Falcon, and Tiger Honey. He and his wife are both lovely people and at the final banquet he won three awards.
And I learned yet more about garden judging. When I came home I found more iris in bloom which I will post pictures of tomorrow.
As, bonjon pointed out, the season was early for tall bearded iris and many were not quite ready to bloom. On the other hand, I have never seen so many MTB's in bloom. I never have thought much about MTBs, but I am now aware that MTB's are great for wind and rain and hail. Most of the ones in this year's convention were lovely. And there were even a fair number of reds, which seems to be a fairly uncommon color in MTB's.
The AIS Convention in Kansas City was fun and exhausting and I am glad to be home.

yes, I slept in late this morning, with DH coddling me a wee bit. It's good to be home.

Pajar, Adoberose, and Nickysiris, it was wonderful to meet you all. I'm only sorry we didn't get more time together! would have loved to visit with y'all on the bus, but I get so motion sick, most of the time in motion I stayed silent and concentrated on not getting sick! NOW DH reminds me I could have taken my travel sickness pills for the plane on the bus too. DUH! DUMB me. oh well.

I did get to know the folks in my own region better, though. up until now I only see them a few times a year, and everyone is always crowded around them asking questions. It was like I finally had them somewhat to myself, to ask more questions. And they took care of me on the bus, too.

Dave Niswonger, also on the front of the tour bus, needed help walking, and I sort of became his "mule" by virtue of being there first. we were teasing about that, because of some family jokes. Fascinating to get a chance to pick his brain on questions about hybridizing as we walked. the botany level sometimes left me behind, which he must have realized, because he got back down on my level. what an awesome opportunity!

The convention was exhausting, but mostly because my desire to see everything and go to everything and heard about everything and meet everyone! and Pajar is right, we lost out somewhat on seeing the TBs, but made up in spades seeing a few SDBs still in bloom, and seeing IBs and MTBs in full bloom. Those MTBs were AWESOME. I've only seen Dancing Lilacs before, which I immediately bought. Now I have a whole list of MTBs and IBs that I've just got to have!

and a few of the Siberian irises bloomed. Dave Niswonger was well represented by his blooming, and we got to see more of Hedgecock's bloom than I've ever seen before. They are both of that region.

Well, guess we'll have to start a new thread of the irises and photos seen at nationals now! LOL

I hope you can for those of us who missed out & those who wonder what AIS & conventions are all about. Dave Niswonger is great & has had that knee trouble which slows him walking, but not in knowledge.

Good idea about the Convention thread, Nicki. I didn't get to sleep late today -- had to take DH to work because his car was rear ended just before I left. He won't have a vehicle for a while now. We will manage.
I did come home to discover many more irises in bloom here at home and have been running around photographing them. While I was at the Convention I missed a few that bloomed and faded before I returned. One of those was Banshee, another was Spring Peeper by Indashade. Oh well. I will see it well next year and get a good picture then. I bet it will have lots more blooms then.
Cat's Eye had a beautiful clump all in blow when I returned and Flying Circus was in full bloom.

Dave Niswonger gave a talk which covered growing and breeding with species iris. It was very interesting and I certainly have to agree that he he has a lot of fascinating things to say and clearly draws on long experience. I learn a lot whenever he opens his mouth. He also can be very funny. He made his kids go out and plant his new little iris plants in the ground. It was muddy and yukky out and the youngest told her mother that she wished she had never married her father! It was cute.