One hundred seventeen years! Thank you to everyone that made it out to the farm to dig, to look, to photograph, and generally enjoy our little slice of flower farming felicity.

Although the colors weren't as spectacular as some year's past (more on that later), certain areas of the farm outside of our normal digging areas did put on a nice display. Splashes of color in an otherwise hot and dry spring. Online ordering is still open until early August so any last-minute cravings are still available (per website inventory).

As always, stay up to date through our website, our Instagram, or our Facebook page for the latest news. Feel free to give us a call as well.

Drought, frost, snow - but no hail! Farming on the Front Range can be frustrating. It seems that Mother Nature always has a new trick to employ and inject some humility into our endeavors. Then again, isn't that why we wake up early, toil in the soil, tune to the sun of June, and grow beautiful flowers to begin with? Farming and gardening are exercises in humility, almost by definition! At least from our perspective...

Grower's gaffes: You may have read in our previous newsletter that our delayed planting of tall-bearded iris meant that many varieties were stunted throughout the season and didn't put on much of a show. That one is definitely on us. As for the rest of the season... what happened to all the bloom?

On April 20 of this year, our neighbor's weather gauge recorded a low of 12 degrees. 12! Not only did it dip this low, but it stayed that way for several hours. As many of you know, our plants stay outside year-round - no hoop houses, row coverings, or plant blankets here - which means this cold front did a number on our normally very hardy plants.

That's not entirely true, the plants themselves may have caught a chill but since they are hardy down to -30 degrees, there was no danger of actually losing the foliage. However, the miniature dwarf varieties were already in bloom. Bye!

Some of the early standard dwarfs that dared to show color this early? No thanks.

The developing stalks in some of the late planted intermediate varieties - frozen solid!

Let's just say that 12 degrees is far too cold that late in the season for a great bloom year. Even with some measure of protection, which an early May snowstorm brought along, there is a temperature boundary to which our sweet delicate blooms just have to say, "another year." 2022 in nutshell.

As for us, when there isn't a rainbow of color to tease our eyes, we get to admire the other qualities of our farm, perhaps with a little more focus. Those bulbs that peak up in one little corner of the house, or maybe the poppies which were able to put on a decent show until getting flattened by aforementioned snow, or maybe even some far-off plants in the goat pastures that only get noticed when someone merely takes the time to look for them.

No matter how you take the seasonal swings, one thing generally remains true - there's always something to check out and appreciate here at Long's Gardens.

As I read the entry from the Spring newsletter, I'm amazed at the difference that even three and a half months can make. As our most intensive part of the season is the two months between roughly mid-April to roughly Mid-June, it becomes almost singular in focus. Back then, I was looking forward - now, with the bloom season behind us - I turn back...

We tried some new things this year, plain and simple. Some worked purely from a labor management perspective, others from a visually enticing one. Underneath that was a deeper value proposition: protect and nurture the soil above all else. The very foundation of our farm has been improving, albeit it slowly, for some time now.

The nature of building soil is an ongoing area of research, both on farm and within the larger community. The speed at which organic matter accumulates is dependent on a multitude of factors, some within our control, some FAR beyond. We are striving to accelerate a process that takes thousands of years outside of human management, with mild successes and minimal failure. One thing is certain as we examine the context of our decisions: we have the ability and drive to try new things, coax life out of areas of potential neglect, while always being deliberate in our impact on the land beneath our feet.

Some of our efforts this year aim to maximize soil building even it means shifting our crop management practices, some of which have been in place for decades. Overall, in tending these urban acres, we strive to be additive to a system when so much of agriculture is focused on elimination.

If there is a weed, pull it. (we still do, selectively)

If there is a bug, kill it. (extremely rarely when it poses a danger to human interaction)

If there is soil texture problem, till it. (less and less, but still, yes)

As you can tell, none of these things are changing in an instant. By the nature of our saleable crop, we do have to do certain things in order to produce consistently healthy bloom and rhizomes for digging and shipping. Over the next years, it is our deepest intention to use perennials for what they do best - staying in the ground for several years while not being overly depletive to the soil to the point where they don't produce the magical color palettes that you all know and love. Expect some changes, perhaps in some fields you don't even know we have. Exciting things happen on the edges of ecosystems, where interactions and experimentation become a playground for future growth. One thing that won't change is the main lure and inspiration for Long's Gardens to exist. Our bearded iris will always be grown with care, and our land will always be handled with a loving touch so that it remains a welcome spot for all.

I was guiding a rangeland and soil monitoring excursion about a month ago for some of the dairy staff so they could be a bit more hands on in the grazing planning and ecological monitoring that needs to happen in making solid management decisions. As we sprawled out in the grass, admiring some of the goat wallows, we entered a discussion about impact. Our human tendencies (especially in the past 160 years or so) have been towards maximization. Our assumption to the top of the evolutionary system has given us extraordinary hubris about what we can do. This might make it seem that I believe we should fade back into a zero impact mindset and this couldn't be farther from the truth. Everything has impact, and there is always balance over time in an ecosystem, but as the dominant species on this planet... what could this world become when our choices lead to good impacts on the land, to move beyond sustainable (what are we sustaining exactly?), and actually create and nurture more life and more complexity and more relationship to the planet we inhabit for such a short time?

Feel free to email me at iris@longsgardens.com if you have any opinions on the matter, suggestions on how to direct plant iris rhizomes into an unprepared soil bed, or a recipe that you feel ridiculously inspired to share. These reflections will return, sometime in October. Thanks for reading and I genuinely hope something nice happens to you today (I saw this on a bumper sticker and really liked it) 

Randy Pistacchio

Director of Farm Stewardship

Long's Gardens is a third generation, family-owned and operated iris farm in the middle of Boulder, Colorado. You can browse our online store here.

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