Hillcrest Iris

Greetings to our Iris Friends!

     What an absolutely wonderful iris season we have had this year. Our past winter season provided just enough cold weather to give us fantastic bloom with the medians and arilbred irises. Those were at peak bloom when we were blessed with 6+ inches of rain in less than two hours. No one was happy after that for about two weeks because very unseasonably cool weather followed.

     All the two-year clump irises and reselected seedlings bloomed and we have introductions set up for the next several years. A bumper crop of seedlings came up in the 500 pots in the driveway and will soon be transplanted. Louisiana and Spuria “children” are coming up in great numbers at the present moment. Check our website for the reselected Louisiana and Spuria future introductions. Our first Louisiana introductions will be forthcoming in 2008. A surprising number of yellow and brown Louisiana irises were well received by visitors.

     Bonnie’s reselected Space Age future introductions will be lined out this summer and a couple should be released next year. Falcon’s Lair and Halloween Debutante for this year are very late rebloomers.

     The new garden location is spaced out so visitors have a chance to walk among the plants with ample space between the rows. Each row being over 200 feet long gives each person quite a workout when viewing the plantings.

     It was amusing to listen to the judges as they evaluated the reselected seedlings. Their comments were welcome and they even liked seedlings that we were thinking about discarding. Isn’t it wonderful that all of us have different taste in what captivates us? Prior year introductions Almost An Angel and Merlin’s Robe were hits in the garden.

     As we are preparing to leave for the National AIS Convention in Oklahoma City, several people driving north have indicated that they plan to stop by the large garden in Mesquite both going and coming from the convention. The Spurias have just started blooming and the new seedlings are truly beautiful.

     Last summer we accumulated a large collection of Miniature Tall Bearded varieties so we can begin hybridizing them. While they increased well, only a few of them bloomed. Next year they should put on a great show.

     Thank you for your letters of encouragement. May each of you and yours have a wonderful iris bloom season!

The Nichols Clan,
Bonnie and Hooker, Bobby Dog, Tonya Dog, Wesley David, Jr. and D.D.-the Cats

Greetings from Hillcrest Gardens