Dissecting Irises

Real pleasure can be found in smelling an iris. I had forgotten, until walking today and seeing a bunch of multi-colored irises, that these flower's smells are differentiated by their colors. I would ask the kids in the garden to smell each color and then report how it smelled. Rootbear was big for the white, chocolate for the purple. I always said vanilla for white, and grape for purple. Funny how different noses smell different things. The bearded iris is really a magnificent entity especially in terms of the internal reproductive flower structure. A pollinator lands on a teeple (the downward pointing "petal" like parts that have the hairy caterpillar seeming "beard" on them--I have been taught that these are called sepals if they are green and upward facing) and walks its way into the flower. Any pollen on the legs of this flower's friend is caught by the beard, possibly helping with reproduction via additional pollen collection. Imagine, if you will, the furry back of a pollinator like a bee. This insect has been feasting on other flower's pollen and so it has this magical ingredient for a seed recipe on its body. When it approaches one of the three stamen with pollen at its top hidden under one of the tiny inner petals it starts to munch. Just above the stamen there is a sticky little lip (the sticky stigma). That lip catches pollen off the body of the pollinator as it eats. From there, the pollen travels down the body of the pistol-like (I say "like" because most plants have one central pistol--the iris has these three lip like parts) spine of the inner-petal. At the base of these "spines" is the ovary of the plant. If you break open the rounded green base at the bottom of the flower you will find the eggs of the iris. From here the pollen combines with an egg and we get the baby plant and the seed coat from this combination. It is important to note that a plant will not be pollinated from its own pollen--the process (in general) requires that the pollen travel to a plant from a different flower. We need pollinators to have seeds! We need seeds to live. Save our pollinators! Seriously, plant reproduction is so interesting and fun to explore and the bearded iris presents lots of easy exploration given its size, and flashy features. Go play with irises...but don't get to carried away...we want those flowers to produce seeds. Oh, and stop and smell flowers too. It is worth it--It's a great breathing exercise, it will lift you mood, and it will hone your nature-sight.