The Iris Virus: The Rangitīkei club and their blooming obsession

Marton man John Vickers, one of the founding members of the Rangitikei Iris Club, will again be entering flowers for judging at the annual show this year.

Flower power has brought a group of Manawatū people together for 40 years now.

They all have one thing in common - a love of the iris flower.

It’s a shared passion affectionately referred to as the “Iris Virus” and it’s this time of year, with the tall-bearded variety in bloom, that symptoms can be more pronounced.

They’re in good company. The colours and form of the iris flower have affected artists through the ages. While perhaps playing second-fiddle to the rose romantically, the iris pops up regularly in prose, and a work by famous painter Van Gogh was titled just that. Irises.

Ever since the Rangitīkei Iris Club was formed it has held an annual show and competition in spring, where the best examples of the flower are celebrated and stories and growing tips can be shared, and blooms of all colour and shape are displayed for public viewing.

At the end of the show, one flower will be crowned Queen of the Show.

Marton couple John and Sarah Vickers were part of a group of iris enthusiasts who met on November 7, 1984 to establish the Rangitīkei Iris Club as a way of sharing, showcasing and celebrating their passion. The club has met every month since.

Club secretary Lindsay Davies still has the orginal minute book from when the Rangitikei Iris Group formed in 1984.

John Vickers, the club’s first secretary, said it formed so enthusiasts could learn more, share their knowledge, and promote the species.

“It is an interesting plant. It stops people in their tracks when they see a bearded iris. That’s why they come to the show. You can see quality and quantity all in one place,” he said.

“They’re not difficult to grow, although you do need good drainage and they don’t like it muggy. Humidity and rot are their enemy. They’ll withstand wind and rain, but not wind and rain together.”

Vickers said iris had been grown in New Zealand since the 1860s. The New Zealand Iris Society was formed by the late Jean Stevens from Bulls in 1950, and there were now 11 branches nationwide.

He’ll again be presenting flowers for judging next weekend: “I always look forward to it. It’s an opportunity for people to come and learn”.

Current president of NZ Iris Society and long-time Rangitīkei club member Carole Flyger is recognised as one of the premier iris judges in New Zealand. She contracted the “Iris Virus” about 20 years ago and joined the club soon after.

She remembers going to her first show with 2 flowers - one in each hand.

Palmerston North Iris enthusiast Carole Flyger with a particularly nice flower called Conspiracy.

She had now won Queen of the Show 5 times.

“I was astounded by their colour and the range of colour. You start with one because it’s pretty, then another, then another, and it quickly turns into an obsession,” she said.

“They’re my thing. They’re my obsession. I just love them.”

She said her husband Graeme shares in the obsession.

An iris grown by Palmerston North woman Thelma Romp.

Palmerston North woman Thelma Romp won Queen of the Show with her first ever entry in the competition 30 years ago.

“I’ve been trying to win again ever since,” she said.

She said it was “pure luck”, but then she was runner-up last year with the same iris, called Fragrant Lilac. It has a lot to do with timing, she said. But entering and showing was it’s own reward.

“I just like playing in the garden,” she said. Her garden is a wonder of colour, with iris popping up in different sections. It’s so colourful it has to be shared, and often she invites neighbourhood children who have hosted parties and played games.

Palmerston North woman Thelma Romp will again have an entry in the annual Rangitikei Iris Show.

The Rangitīkei Club has the distinction of producing a world-famous iris. The late Shirley Spicer, a Rangitīkei Iris Club member from Whanganui who died four years ago, was a Dykes Medal winner in 2004 with her bloom Salute D’Amour. She was the second New Zealand person ever to receive it.

The Dykes Memorial Medal was started by the British Iris Society in 1926 to honour its founder William Rickatson Dykes (1877-1925), a noted English researcher, hybridiser and gardener, and writer of the authoritative monograph, The Genus Iris.

The medal is the highest award an iris can receive and is also awarded in the United Kingdom, United States, and Australia. The New Zealand Dykes Medal can be awarded every second year by the British Iris Society on the recommendation of the New Zealand Iris Society.

The first New Zealander to win a Dykes Medal was Carterton woman Francis Love, who received the award in 1995 for the Siberian iris ‘Emma Ripeka’. Ron Busch won the award in 2012 with ‘Norma of Irwell’, and Hamilton woman Alison Nicoll for ‘Atavus’ in 2014.

The tall-bearded iris generally flower during October and November in New Zealand, sometimes as late as December. There are several other varieties, like the Japanese iris that current Rangitīkei club secretary Lindsay Davies and wife Sue are fond of, but they flower a little bit later on and miss the show.

Palmerston North man Lindsay Davies with an iris called For Gretchen.

They’re his speciality. Some flowers are “the size of dinner plates”. They also have a collection of tall-bearded, which are coming into bloom in time for the show.

Club convenor Michelle Westhead said she became involved after falling in love with the flower and wanting to learn more and grow more varieties, only to discover a thriving club on her back doorstep.

“I wanted more and wanted to learn more about them,” she said.

Iris is a perennial plant that grow from seeds or rhizomes and needs sun, but not necessarily all-day sun. It has long, erect flowering stems and sword-shaped leaves. The iris flower sepals usually spread or droop downwards.

Michelle Westhead with a blooming iris.

In their centre, some of the rhizomatous irises have a “beard”, a row of fuzzy hairs at the base of each falls petal which gives pollinators a landing place and guides them to the nectar.

The shape of the flower and the position of the pollen-receiving and stigmatic surfaces on the outer petals form a landing pad for a flying insect in search of nectar, who then transfer pollen from one flower to the next.

Flowers can be cloned from rhizomes, reproducing the same variety if plant. Growing from seed can give a completely different colour as they are fertilised by bees carrying pollen from other varieties - natures way of widening the gene pool.

An iris in the garden belonging to Palmerston North woman Michelle Westhead.

There are between 300 and 400 entries expected in the annual Rangitīkei Iris Club Show, to be held November 9 at Ferguson Street Leisure Centre. Admission is free.

Some examples of iris prose:

- “What in your life is calling you, When all the noise is silenced, The meetings adjourned...The lists laid aside, And the Wild Iris blooms by itself In the dark forest...What still pulls on your soul?” - Rumi.

- “In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish’d dove; In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.” - Alfred Lord Tennyson.

- “I have had more than half a century of such happiness. A great deal of worry and sorrow, too, but never a worry or a sorrow that was not offset by a purple iris, a lark, a bluebird, or a dewy morning glory.” - Mary McLeod Bethune.