Irises - Historic Iris Preservation Society

8 PRESENT-DAY GARDENING
bulbous plants such as Moraeas, which used, indeed,
formerly to be classed with Irises. But what is the difference
between an Iris and a Moraea ? The standard book
on the Irideae affords us no further light on this question
than that Irises
grow north of the Equator and Moraeas
south of it ! This may be true, but it is
hardly scientific,
although it would certainly add to the interest with which
the botanical world would await the first flowering of any
bulbous plants that might be brought from the temperate
regions on the Kenia and Kilimanjaro Ranges, which lie
almost directly under the Equator in Central Africa. As
a matter of fact Irises are only separated from Moraeas
by the existence of a tube, however short, between the
ovary and the base of the segments of the perianth. In
a Moraea, the divisions of the flower rise directly from
the top of the ovary without the intervention of any tube.
The six segments of the flowers of an Iris are popularly
known as the "standards" and the "falls." The terms
are convenient, but nevertheless inappropriate when applied
to such groups as that of the Juno Irises, where the standards
are either horizontal or drooping, while the falls
stand up
at an angle of at least 45. In addition to these six
segments, there are the three style branches, which arch
over the anthers and bear on their under side near the
extremity the stigmatic surface, through which the flower
is fertilised. The style branches form the roof and the
haft of the falls the floor of a kind of tunnel. The
stigma projects downwards at the mouth of this tunnel,
along the roof of which lie the anthers. These bear the
pollen, and at their base exudes the nectar which entices
the insects.