Episode 3408

- [Narrator] Iris have a long history, having been in cultivation for thousands of years. Tammy Algood finds a variety of bloom colors and forms in the home garden of an avid collector of these reliable perennials. Then we learn about biodynamic farming and its emphasis on creating a balanced and self-sustaining ecosystem. Jeff Poppen, a longtime practitioner, shares key elements involved in achieving a rich humus soil that in turn produces a vitamin-rich harvest of food crops. Join us. Iris are so pretty, relatively easy to grow and attract pollinators.

- If you like unique irises like this one, you're in luck today. We are visiting a home that has a showcase of irises of stunning variety. Irises are regal, late spring flowers. We are here in Franklin today, at the home of Sue Craddock, who is not just a member, but an essential member of the Middle Tennessee Iris Society. Sue, thank you for hosting us today.

- You're welcome.

- Show us these beautiful specimens of irises that you have, because there's some I've never seen before. They're lovely.

- Thank you. Well, irises are pass-along plants, and, you know, you get them from different people, and some of them are very old. And a companion flower with them are the snapdragons and the pansies, because of the time of year. This one here was given to me by a friend in Indianapolis. And also the next one he gave me from Indianapolis. This is Sea Power, and that one is Designer's Art over there. So, I just enjoy working with them. And they're just about finished blooming for the season, and, you know, I'll fertilize them in about four to six weeks, and grow, then I'll put out petunias.

- There you go. And right here beside you, we've got what? This is lovely. This is what I think about when I think about an iris.

- [Sue] This is William Setchell, and it's a 1938. That's how old.

- [Tammy] Wow.

- [Sue] I have one that's 1868, but it's not blooming this year.

- [Tammy] Gotcha.

- [Sue] So I can't show you that.

- [Tammy] And the lovely little light-pink one that's right over here, what is that?

- [Sue] That one's called Mind Changer, and it doesn't grow as big as the pink one we saw over there.

- [Tammy] So you really need to know when you're planting them who's the big guys and who's the smaller ones.

- Right. This year, I dug everything up, and I have a map of where everything is, so if I lose the tag.

- Yeah.

- I know where it's supposed to be. This is Get My Number, and I got it from friends in Alabama that grow lots of irises. It has very sturdy stems, and a lot of blooms per stem. I've already cut several of them off. So it's-

- [Tammy] So you don't even have to stake this one, it's just so sturdy.

- [Sue] I haven't so far, so it's been really well.

- [Tammy] That's fascinating to me always, because they look so frilly and fragile.

- [Sue] So fragile.

- [Tammy] Right.

- [Sue] But, you know, they're just beautiful.

- [Tammy] Yes, they are.

- [Sue] This is Elizabeth Parkhill, and I like it because it's pink. Most of 'em are purple or yellow, I mean, they're more common than the pink ones. But it also has sturdy stems, and there's one, two, three, four, five blooms on that one stalk.

- [Tammy] Wow.

- [Sue] And, you know, that one's gonna have several. So those are great.

- [Tammy] I love it, 'cause it's just barely pink.

- [Sue] So, it's pretty.

- This is Radiant Apogee that my mother had, I think she bought it off of the back of Parade Magazine years ago. And this is called a plicata, because it has white falls with the yellow edges around it.

- [Tammy] It's beautiful. And you said this is probably the last one of the season.

- [Sue] Yeah, there's one more bloom, but this was all. But, you know, they're finished. But, you know, irises, some of 'em are earlier, and mid, and late. This one blooms in late April, and, you know, you have all different, you know, early, mid, and late, and maybe a few things into May, but mine will be mostly gone by May. When you buy them, or if you look up the name, 'cause you can go to the website, and it'll tell you what year it was introduced, and also when it should bloom.

- [Tammy] Got it.

- [Sue] This is Chase the North Star, another plicata with the edges different than the fall, the standards which stand up are a little different, and it's a 2023. Gorgeous.

- [Tammy] Yes. I love the ruffled interior. So tell me about this one, because it's a little bit different.

- [Sue] It is different. It's between a brown and a burgundy, and it's called Siva Siva, a 1961 that I retrieved from near a patio in West Virginia. So, I had to look for it, it kind of disappears sometimes.

- [Tammy] It does. Yeah, it does disappear into the landscape.

- [Sue] This is one of the older irises, being 1910, and you really can't kill it, it just grows, and grows, and grows, and multiplies. It's not as fancy as the real ruffled ones.

- [Tammy] Right.

- [Sue] And they're more temperamental and more finicky than the others. You can grow this one anywhere, so.

- You know what? I almost feel like I've seen these on the side of the road.

- You probably have, because it's one of the older ones.

- [Tammy] Right. Yeah.

- [Sue] And it just keeps on growing. This one is Frank Adams, another old one that grows very easily, and it was in my grandmother's garden.

- [Tammy] Oh, that makes it even prettier, doesn't it?

- [Sue] Yes. It's a 1935. And, again, it just, it's strong, like the old ones.

- [Tammy] Yeah, they have stay power, don't they?

- [Sue] They do. They do.

- [Tammy] I like you, Frank. And what is this?

- [Sue] This one I don't have a name for yet, it was given to me by a friend recently, and I've gotta find the name for it.

- [Tammy] Well, it's quite pretty.

- [Sue] It is, deep color.

- [Tammy] Yes, it is. And obviously blooms late.

- [Sue] Yes, yes.

- So this one is so purple, it's blue. What is this?

- [Sue] This is Full Tide, 1972. And it looks like a pretty strong one also, 'cause there's one, two, three, four, five, five buds on that one, four more to open up. So it's probably late season.

- [Tammy] Right.

- [Sue] I just planted that one this year though, so. It likes it, it likes the spot.

- For Iris newbies, what do you suggest for them to do? Is there a particular kind, or do you have particular tips that would make it successful?

- Well, I prefer the tall bearded. There's several different ones, but I prefer the tall bearded. They like full sun, and they do not like wet feet, so put 'em where the soil's going to drain real well. I will probably fertilize them the first time in February, early February, around, do not put it on the rhizome. And I usually use 5, 10, 10, or espoma something. And then, after they bloom, four to six weeks, I will fertilize them again.

- [Tammy] Okay, and then for planting, because it's counterintuitive to how we plant plants.

- [Sue] It is. It definitely is.

- [Tammy] So talk to us about how it needs to be planted.

- [Sue] You have the rhizome, and then the roots hanging down, and you need to dig a hole, make a mound in the center, and then spread the roots over that mound, and pull the dirt in on the sides. Do not bury the rhizome.

- See, that seems so weird.

- Well, the rhizome is not the root, it's the stem. So the roots are under that, and the rhizome likes to be baked by the sun.

- [Tammy] Got it. So does that encourage blooming?

- [Sue] It encourages everything, I mean, all kinds of growth. But if you'll notice, most of my rhizomes are exposed.

- Yes. I see them.

- And I've used mulch around stuff, but then, you know, you can either take your blower and just blow it off, I used the broom, and just broom, you know, took the mulch, anything, 'cause the animals, you know, move the mulch for you. So, yeah.

- They're funny like that.

- Yeah, sometimes you have to go back and take it off, but.

- [Tammy] Okay so, this has already done its thing.

- [Sue] It has.

- [Tammy] And so now the temptation is to leave it alone, but you say no.

- [Sue] Right.

- [Tammy] What do we need to do to this now?

- [Sue] This rhizome that bloomed here, here, here, will not bloom again. So you can just break it off.

- [Tammy] Oh, that seems so cruel.

- [Sue] Like that.

- [Tammy] Right.

- [Sue] Okay. Now, the rhizome does not bloom again, but it makes increases along the outsides, and that's where your next irises come from.

- So this keeps you from having ugly foliage.

- [Sue] Yeah, you don't want all this stuff on there. Here's another one.

- [Tammy] And just break it off at the ground level.

- [Sue] At the ground, yeah. Or cut it off, whichever. But yeah, since it does not bloom again, you just need to get rid of it. But it does make increases along the side of the root, you know, along the side of the rhizome.

- Got it. This has been an incredible tour, Sue. Thank you for allowing us to love your garden with our eyes. It is beautiful.

- Well, I appreciate you coming, because I like to share it, so.

- Well, it's beautiful. Thank you.

- Thank you. Thank you for coming.

- The biodynamic method offers many practical guidelines for gardeners. Energy for growing plants is in the form of nitrogen, and it's found in life. Bio means life, dynamics means energy. Biodynamics, born as a response to synthetic, lifeless nitrogen, says yes to compost, and humus, and life, and no to chemicals. We find life in the humus in the soil, the dark, fertile part of the soil. Humus comes from leaf mold, and manures, old rotten hay, or forest products from the forest floor. We can go into the woods, into a low lying area, and you'll find where leaves and rotted logs have been sitting for a long time, and get really nice, black-looking, good humus products. We use all of these things in the compost piles. This is where we grow the microbes and form the humus-clay complex that we want in our soils. That's why it's a good idea to add clay soils to the compost, because it has lots of microbes and minerals in it. The compost itself then is a mixture of all these things, and you can sort of still see some of the old leaves that are all falling apart, some of the wood products. But before we use it, we want to get a product that doesn't smell, and that is just ready to go. I might let this pile sit for a little bit longer. This white stuff are the threads of fungal hyphae, that's really valuable in your garden. Yeah, this is good stuff right here. This is old, rotted hay, on its way to forming humus. Kitchen scraps and garden refuse go in the compost pile too. This compost here is ready to use, totally humified, and looking beautiful. The more we use really good composts in our gardens, and I'm talking inches deep, then the less Mother Nature will have to send in her compost makers, which are the insects and diseases. Another way to get humus is to grow your own. We grow cover crops. In the summer, these would be buckwheat, sedan grass, sun hemp, and cow peas. But these are all frost-tender. In the wintertime, we grow a whole different set of crops. This is rye. We also grow wheat. These are grains. This one here is crimson clover, just about to start to flower. The yellow flowers are turnips. These crops, like all cover crops, will be mown when they're in peak flower, and then gently incorporated to the soil a few weeks before planting. Biodynamic farmers taught me the value of using rock dust in my gardening. We use lime to sweeten up the soil, it helps to raise the pH from all the carbonatious materials that we've been adding, lower the pH, they're acidic. So we always have to add lime if we're using lots of mulches, and composts, and leaf molds, and things like that. Paramagnetic rock dust come from volcanoes. This is basalt. The value of paramagnetic rocks and volcanic dust was revealed when Mount St. Helens erupted in 1980 and spread ash around the surrounding fields and forests, which grew dramatically better afterwards. This reinforced the idea that these volcanic rocks are important for building soils. We also use rock phosphate. It's a rock dust called apatite that's mined near Columbia, Tennessee. And then we always use some wood ashes, which also contain trace elements, which these things do too. And potassium and lime. High quality, and nutrient density in your food come from the plants being able to access easily all that they need to grow healthily. Humus is the key here, because it unlocks the minerals that are in the soil so that they'll be in the food that you eat. We use gentle tillage to aerate the soil, check evaporation, and keep the weeds at bay. Then we might want to use a mulch to cover up the soil, to keep the rains and stuff off of it, and keep the soil nice and loose underneath. And of course, this mulch will rot into a humus and further enhance the life of the soil. With good sun above, and good drainage below, you should be good to go. Our biodynamic farm doesn't use much plastic. Instead of a black, plastic mulch, we just keep the ground loosely cultivated like farmers did before plastic and chemicals. For irrigation, we rely on deep tillage, the winter rains, and then a dust mulch on top. So we don't use any of that drip irrigation either, no irrigation at all. And we don't use plastic-covered hoop houses to start our seeds in the spring, we use these old-fashioned coal frames. Sometime in the beginning of April, I'll take some pepper and tomato seeds, and I have this nice leaf mold humus here. And I set the seeds, oh, approximately two inches apart or so in this little furrow right here, not very deep. And then I firm 'em in real good. And just lightly cover 'em up. And they'll give us plenty of tomatoes and peppers come around the middle of May when they need to go out into the field. I'll cover 'em with these old window sashes. Biodynamic gardeners often do companion planting, and this is where plants that love to grow each other are planted next to each other. So, over the years, many gardeners have noticed that some plants do better next to other ones. Here, we have comfrey plants near our grapevines. Here we have a border of herbs and flowers that are next to where the vegetables will be. A garden can have flowers, herbs, and all kinds of pollinating plants interspersed throughout it. They mutually help each other. Planting by the signs refers to the movement of the moon through the various constellations of the zodiac, and also the nodes, and whether it's running high or low, and the different phases of the moon and where the planets are. So I keep a calendar, but I believe this stuff works, but it's also complicated, I really don't understand it real well. And I'm much more interested in what the soil till is, how much moisture's in the soil, and whether it's gonna rain or not. So, generally, I let the weather dictate what I do, not the calendar. For a fruit tree, like this apple here, biodynamic orchardists mix up a tree paste. It's made from clay, basalt and compost, and then made into a slurry and used to whitewash the bark of the trees. The basalt, of course, is volcanic minerals, and you have the humus, and the clay mediates between those two. You can add seaweeds or herbal preparations to the mix too, just like you would in a compost pile. We usually just go up to the first scaffolding branches or so. Commercial orchardists oftentimes use a whitewash made of lime and water, this sort of replaces that. Gardens are magical, and biodynamics opened my mind to their many mysteries. By observing plant growth with an active perception day after day, gardening intuition develops. For example, now I wonder why an insect infestation is there, rather than just wanting to kill all the bugs that I see. Oftentimes, I'm the one that's caused the problem. When I get the soil too compacted, you can be sure that beetles will be there. And if I add undecomposed materials to the soils, things that are stinky, manure that's not rotted down and fermented properly, I'll get nitrates, and that flush of nitrates will always bring leaf-eating insects. That's why it's important, when we put things on our gardens, that they're fully decomposed. Biodynamic practitioners make a great humus-forming product. We take regular old cow manure and we stuff it into a cow horn and bury it over the winter time, and then we add some herbal preparations to it, and make this really nice humus-like product. It's full of microbes and various things that will help our soils to make humus itself. The way we use it is we put it into a crock, and put some warmed up water in there, and we stir it up real good. After thoroughly mixing the horn manure with the water, I simply take a whisk broom and sprinkle it over the land. We balance this humus-forming product with one that helps the plants ripen. This is ground up powdered quartz crystals that's been buried in a cow horn for the summer months. And we take a small amount of this, just like a little teaspoon full, and this, we stir up again, just like we did the other in the warm water, and sprinkle it on the plants. This helps to release minerals. You'll notice in biodynamics, we're often using both the humus-forming processes, with calcium, and compost, and things of that nature, and balancing it with silicious mineral substances, silica in the rock dusts. Biodynamics is revered worldwide for producing high-quality vegetables, fruits, and wines. This is because the nitrogen that's used comes from life, humus, compost, not from chemicals.

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