Wednesday, March 2, 2016

AIS Blog WORLD OF IRISES Five Year Anniversary

By Andi Rivarola

It is not often that we dare to take time to look back at our history and accomplishments (or lack thereof) and find that we're looking at it with a sense of amazement and surprise. 

I remember imagining an AIS Blog over five years ago and how providing such service would help the AIS tap into the huge online plant/flower audience. It wasn't a marketing idea, at least in my mind, as much a way to share the knowledge of irisarians with the many iris enthusiasts that I have come to know online from around the world. 



Could it be done? 

Well, the answer to that question is here, five years later. An amazing array of intelligent, giving, caring people have been a part of this blogging team, a group willing to share their personal experiences of growing, caring, and experimenting with the iris plants we all love. 





The result has more than met my initial expectations, and I hope that you have caught our sense of excitement and enthusiasm with what we share in the World of Irises.

Happy 5th Year Anniversary AIS Blogging Team!  You are the ones that make this blog happen. I hope this humble post will convey my huge sense of gratitude. 





Thanks too to former members of our blogging team Jim Hedgecock, Jim Murrain, and Evey Blalock, and to our occasional posters J. Griffin Crump and Mike Unser.  

I thought it would be fun to list a few of the subjects this group has covered both in words and images: tall bearded irises, median irises, spuria irises, Louisiana irises, historic irises, Pacific Coast Native irises, AIS National Conventions, species irises from around the world, new publications, updates on IRISES publications, irises and snow, bog irises, international iris news, aril and arilbred irises, hybridizer news, news of the AIS, the evolution of irises, confessions of an iris lover, winter in our garden patch, reblooming irises, novelty irises, biographies of hybridizers, hybridizers of our AIS past, Siberian irises, tending the iris crop, award winner announcements, iris color terminology, and so many other subjects I can't list them all.



Get to know the Bloggers

If you want to get to know the bloggers, follow their posts, ask questions in the comment section located at the end of each post; or go to The American Iris Society Facebook page and post your comment there. 

We see through their eyes, as each blogger brings out with their post their own relationship with irises, in words and pictures that are unique to them, and in the interim they help you and me gain some knowledge too.