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Greater St. Louis Iris Society!
(Organized circa 1950)
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Greater St. Louis Iris Society newsletter
NOVEMBER, 2008 |
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The Pres Says:
The end of our current year is upon us, folks. The schedule for 2008 will be completed with our Club meeting on December 7, and a new year will begin on January 1st. I believe it has been a fruitful year thanks to our hard working club members. Our Iris shows for 2008 were successfully accomplished. More display flowers and a larger attendance is always welcome, of course! The Iris sales and auctions went well and were profitable. Again, thanks to all those who worked so hard to make it happen. The work in the Iris garden at MOBOT was sometimes frustrating for those who did the work but all is well there also; again due to the very dedicated diligence of those members who gave of their personal time and hard work.
Meeting attendance was down this year. I invite all of you to submit ideas and sugges-tions for improving participation and interest on the part of our members and also for increasing membership. As you all know we can't buy membership. It doesn't come in a bag or a box. Our club must offer the stuff that members want or the interest disappears. So be critical and identify that stuff which seems to be missing. And plan to bring a friend to a meeting!
As a possibility to make it easier for people who don't like to drive at night, we're going to try meeting on the fourth Sunday afternoon, rather than fourth Friday nights, this year. Let us know what you think of this idea.
Our club officers have done their best to make
2008 a good year. I thank all of them and the members that supported them for a great job well done. You can be proud of your 2008 accomp-lishments. I hope next year will turn out as fine.
The club will soon have a very nice web page thanks to Jim Morris and his almost single-handed heroic efforts in conjunction with the SIU-Edwardsville student team headed by Kyle Kesting I look forward to the completion and Jim's round-up report. A big thanks to Jim for that effort.
I am looking forward to seeing you all at our next meeting on December 7, 2008. This will be our annual Thanksgiving/Christmas Holiday end of year pot-luck meeting with turkey and whatever you decide to bring, bingo and fellowship. We can talk about how to make next year even better!
Bob Barker
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HOLIDAY POT-LUCK IS THE NEXT GSLIS BIG EVENT- Y'ALL COME !
We'll meet in the Beaumont Room on Sunday, December 7 (Yes, this coming Sunday noon!) at 12:30 (Plan to eat at 1:00). The club furnishes meat, bread, and tableware-you bring a side dish or dessert, and we'll eat like kings and play bingo for iris/garden & other prizes.
We'll plan to have 2009 AIS iris calendars available for $4 each.
(We may also discuss what you want to see GSLIS do next year. Does the idea of Sunday afternoon meetings appeal to you, or not? More demos, fewer slide programs, what kind of educational endeavors? Change meeting location? Give this some thought and input your ideas.)
Sunday, January 18, 2:00 pm -
Board Meeting to set Budget - location to be announced. (No general meeting in Jan.)
Sunday, February 22, 2:00 pm -
GSLIS General Meeting - program to be announced
Sunday, March 22, 2:00 pm -
GSLIS General Meeting - program to be announced
Greater St. Louis Iris Society Contacts
President: Bob Barker 636-240-3911
Vice-Pres: Jim Morris 636-256-3927 Secretary: Jean Morris 636-256-3927 Treasurer: Judy Watters 314-878-0460 Past Pres: Nyla Hughes 314-961-6745
To join GSLIS, send dues to Judy Watters,
2518 Westrick, Maryland Hts., MO 63043
$5 single annual or $8 dual annual
Meetings will be held at Missouri Botanical Garden, 2:00 pm, 4th Sunday of Feb., March, Sept., Oct. Flower shows April and May, MOBOT Iris Sale in August, Picnic/Members' Bearded Iris Auction in August, Beardless Iris Members' Auction in September, Holiday Pot Luck in December.
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GSLIS September & October Meetings
(As we didn't have a quorum at either of these meetings, no official business was conducted.)
September 26, 2008
The meeting was called to order by President Bob Barker at 7:45. We welcomed new member Pat Moore, attending her first meeting.
Treasurer Judy Watters reported that the GSLIS / MOBOT sale cleared approximately $9,000, though not all expenses were in yet. (A large portion of this accrues to the Botanical Garden for the sale of their rhizomes, however.)
Judy reported that even though many member- workers used their "iris bucks" to pay for purchases at the Bearded Auction, the club still made $58. This was very satisfactory, since the main purpose of the auction is to get great new irises distributed to our members.
There were also irises for sale at the meeting for bargain prices, excess from previous sales/auction.
Door prize drawing results:
TBs to Joan Kellar, Judy Watters, Beth Holbrook, (Bob Barker took his door prize from the 'extras' sale table.) Medians to Pat Moore and Nyla Hughes
The meeting adjourned, and was followed by the Beardless Iris Auction conducted by Marilyn Ruemmler.Thanks to the generosity of our suppliers for this sale, Don Delmez Gardens, Bob Barker, and Aitkens Salmon Creek Gardens, attendees got some gorgeous new LAs, Japanese, Spurias, and Siberians at great discounts!
October 24, 2008
A colorful program was presented by Jim Morris of selected iris slides from conventions of the year.
A Special Thanks
To all the people who helped us get ready for the MOBOT/GSLIS Iris Sale-who are too numerous to mention by name-thanks for the time and effort you put into making this a big success! A lot of credit goes to our MOBOT volunteers who did all the digging there-Jim and Jean Morris, Gary Kellar (and I think we even drafted Ann for work!), and Judy Watters. Please give your hard-working selves a pat on the back!
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As chairman of the Iris Auctions for our Members, I want to give special thanks to Gary Keller, Andrea Herndon, Marilyn Ruemmler and Rita Gormley for finding gorgeous color pictures that made things sell. Our customers are spoiled-without pictures, rhizomes just sit there! Special thanks also to those who contributed irises-Marilyn, Ginni Hill, Riley Probst, Don Delmez, and Bob Barker. We appreciated the auctioneering efforts of Jim Morris, Riley-and Marilyn, who also provided sale baskets.
And we couldn't operate without our wonderful and long-suffering treasurer, Judy Watters, who not only gets supplies and keeps track as we go along, but works up all those detailed reports. And for special needs, we still call on Rita and Tom Gormley-far from here in miles, but not in e-mail! Bless you all, faithful GSLIS workers!
Nyla Hughes,'08 Auction Chair
Report From the Alice Goodman Garden
If you got down to Missouri Botanical Garden in iris bloom season this spring, you enjoyed a bounteous, unparalleled display of amazing beauty! After the almost-no bloom of the previous late-freeze season, the Alice Goodman garden made up for lost time. (See pics p.54-55 in the October AIS Bulletin!)
There are great things coming for next year too. The Garden has (finally, after 3 years!) gotten the irrigation in place in the beds for Siberian, Louisiana, and Species-X irises over by the bald-cypress trees. (and their roots-at least temporarily-out.)
We've planted about 36 Siberians, with room for maybe ten more. (Some were contributed and some were salvaged from last year's discarded planting.) Still looking for 'White Swirl'-anyone? We've also put in about four dozen mostly contributed LAs, with room for a dozen more. We've tried to represent different flower and growth forms, classics, and new innovations in all possible colors.
Across from the main beds, toward the wall, we're taking out the TBs that get watered with the grass every week, and suffer from rot and crickets. (Tho they had good fall rebloom, did you see?) They'll be replaced in back with I. pseudacorus and tectorum selections, that can withstand some shade, and in front with dwarfs.
We're trying to get more SDBs in the corners of the main beds, more rebloomers of all classes, and for those who like historics, you'll find quite a few in the garden now, since Jason Delaney likes them too.
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