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“Or, should I forget the whole thing and leave them for the Spring?”

Yes. Iris need to be moved in August in our zone. If you move them now, the rhizomes will not get any roots down and will likely rot in their new home.

If they are happy where they are (as in blooming and setting lots of nice greenery) then leave them alone until next August. Mark your calendar now!

Add yes, I am ‘into’ gardening, LOL! Just a little. I manage a local garden center and I have had an organic garden on my farm for 15 years now. I was also a manager for The Seed Savers Exchange when they had a shop in Madison, and I’m a few credits shy of being a Master Gardener. Ran out of time, and besides I was already ‘living the dream’ by then.

Ask me anything. I’m glad to help. :)

Wow! Thank you Diana. My problem is that these iris are in a garden that just developed to mask to cover to my septic sysm — a couple of roses, a bird bath, a few bulbs, miniature irises, an arch — then lengthened with excess soil from a rose garden I planted nearby. It’s on a slight slope so that one side is higher than the other — both ways. To keep weeds out, I finally got my husband to build a low wall around it which left one side without enough dirt.

Everything is still in place, but I need to lift and divide these irises (shown up thread) and backfill planting soil underneath to level out this bed. Also, the miniature irises need to move to the front because they are totally overpowered by the large blue irises.

I know that I have left it too long, BUT, should I do this work immediately next spring? Do I really have to wait until August?

I should add that the blue (many shades and varieties) irises are the repeat blooming type. So they are blooming again in August, which is why I missed my window this year.

Thanks for your answer. I’ve forgotten where you live in WI. Northwest of me, I think. I’m in Mequon, just north of Milwaukee on the border of Cedarburg.

Your plans for potting tulips sound lovely. I’m trying to do the same thing. I already have several pots planted of red tulips and double daffodils (yellow). I don’t know what to do with them next. A friend gave me a bag of 100 red tulips. All my tulips planting areas are already full, and anyplace else in the yead I plant them will likely become lunch for wandering deer and rabbits.

The garden center here told me to dig a trench and bury the pots and cover them with a thick layer of mulch. Since these are big pots, this will have to be a deep trench — not easy in our thick, Mequon clay. My hubby is not keen on that task. What if I HALF buried the pots and put bags of leaves around them for protection with heavy mult over them?

Or, do you prefer the garage for winter storage? (I’m going to have to really clean the garage to make room for them. Not a bad idea, but probaly harder to help from my husband than digging a trench.) I did print the article you linked and will read it again.

I have 3 outbuildings, but they are impossible for me to reach in the winter, so no watering will get done. The basement is heated. I do have a crawl space under my bedroom — again very inconvenient to reach. I wonder if it is cold enough, however? There is no furnace there anymore — furnace has been moved.

How much watering needs to be done in the winter for potted tulips? I have lots more bulbs to plant and I may just cram them into the ground — rabbits or not.