Bad, bad Deanna

Discussion in 'Flower Gardening' started by stratsmom, Sep 26, 2016.

  1. stratsmom

    stratsmom Flower Fanatic

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    I am ashamed of myself and might feel better if I get this off my chest...
    My iris bed sits on the south side of our garage. It has provided me with hours and hours of
    "therapy" (weeding and planting and planning and admiring) But, when my dad got sick and passed away in 2013 I was gone so much that summer that the iris bed, along with all the other flower beds was badly neglected. It was overrun with quack grass and milkweed, then this summer a wild sweet pea got in there and took over! I've meant to clean it and take care of it but it was so overwhelming I just continued to let it go. Until last weekend! It was a beautiful weekend and I was working on the other flower beds, had them all looking good when I walked past the ugly bramble of tall grass, mildewed sweet pea and dead iris. I reached in and grabbed a handful of that damn sweet pea and gave a yank! Then another yank, really started to see a difference in 10 minutes!! I went back today and began again, pulling and digging and raking. My poor, poor iris have been buried in there, waiting for me to rescue them. The bed is not 100% yet but boy it sure looks better. So many of the tubers were rotten and that makes me very sad. But, many are still good and solid. I didn't dig any of them because it is so late in the season. My plan is to finish the bed next weekend. Maybe feed it really good before winter hits and then after they bloom next spring I am attacking that entire bed like a crazy woman!!! I plan to dig out all the iris, roto-till and roto-till and roto-till and then treat with round up. Wait my 7 or 10 days or however long it is and put those babies back in a beautiful bed. My back hurts but my heart is proud as I walk past the garage and gaze at all my hard work:)
     
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  3. 2ofus

    2ofus Hardy Maple

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    After so much work I say 'good, good Deanna!' It is such hard work to reclaim a flowerbed that I'm sure you have some sore muscles but it was well worth it. I would suggest that you round up first, wait until the weeds start dying, then rototill, wait a couple of weeks for the seeds to sprout and round up again, wait however long round up recommends then plant your iris. It takes a few days for round up to reach the roots to kill them. At least that was what I was told. Maybe someone else knows more about it.
     
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  4. Cayuga Morning

    Cayuga Morning Strong Ash Plants Contributor

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    You go girl!!!
     
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  5. eileen

    eileen Resident Taxonomist Staff Member Moderator Plants Contributor

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    Deana if that's you being bad then I think you should continue and be very bad!!
     
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  6. Ronni

    Ronni Hardy Maple

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    Deanna, please can you come be bad at my place? ;)
     
  7. stratsmom

    stratsmom Flower Fanatic

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    You gals crack me up!!! :p
     
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  8. Islandlife

    Islandlife Young Pine

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    Go go go go GO!! :)
     
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  9. Sherry8

    Sherry8 I Love Birds!

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    I get tall quack grass, pickers, dandelions all of the time....so don't put yourself down. They just seem to grow faster than anything else in the garden. Most of my iris are soft, I will dig them out with weather permitting. It didn't seem like we had too much rain but we must have. My flower beds should be all cleaned up by now but we have been so busy with the lake property. With no one there besides the man cutting the grass, the shore line is a mess. We are working on it and hopefully no snow will fall or the bitter cold waits until the end of Nov.
     
  10. purpleinopp

    purpleinopp Young Pine Plants Contributor

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    Your plan sound like a lot more work than necessary. Tilling wrecks the drainage and shouldn't be necessary for Iris to be happy, or for any spot that's been tilled before. Doing it once to loosen soil that is like concrete (like areas reclaimed from mowing) can be helpful but not necessary beyond that.

    RU works by being absorbed by foliage and delivered into the plant. The more foliage present @ time of application, (and by following other directions regarding temperature & time of day,) the more effective it will be.

    Have you determined if the vines you were pulling are annual or perennial? If annual, there shouldn't be any live roots to worry about next year.

    Putting organic matter (leaves, grass clippings, mulch, kitchen scraps, compost) on the surface is the way mother nature does it in natural areas that aren't tended by humans. The critters like worms & other smaller microbes perform the decomposition process and deposit the remains at a level in and in a form which roots can use. Tilling damages the layers that take years to form. Dr. Ingham explains all of this brilliantly in about 15 minutes.
     
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