Region 21 Fall 2022 Meeting – Sioux Falls, South Dakota

Everyone is invited to the American Iris Society Region 21 Fall Membership Meeting! We will be having presentations from iris hybridizer Hooker Nichols on Tall Bearded Irises and on Louisiana Irises, two of the many types of irises he has hybridized. Join us Friday evening August 12 and all day Saturday August 13, 2022

Details and the registration form were mailed to all Region 21 members last month. In case they did not reach you, here are copies (pdfs).

Invitation and Details

Registration Form

Hope to see you there!

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Please Vote in the 2021 AIS Tall Bearded Symposium – Deadline September 15

A reminder that there is still time to vote in the 2021 Tall Bearded Iris Symposium. The ballot was included with the Spring 2021 Irises Bulletin and is also available online here (PDF). Everyone, member or not, is eligible to vote for up to 25 of the 447 TBs on the ballot.

Your votes should reach the Region 21 RVP (Wayne Messer – wrmesser@gmail.com) by September 15th.  A list of your choices and their numbers would be great.

Complete details on how to vote are available. You can also see results from previous years voting there.

Thank you for your participation.

Region 21 Virtual Fall 2021 Meeting

Reminder – This year’s Region 21 Fall Meeting is virtual! Please join us Saturday, August 14, 2021 at 10:00 a.m. Central Time (9:00 a.m. Mountain Time) on Zoom for Judges Training by Bonnie Nichols on Novelty Irises. Bonnie is the AIS Judges Chair as well as president of the Novelty Iris Society. Note: This is a new Judges Training available for credit even if you have already participated in the JT Bonnie presented as two AIS Webinars last year.


Registration (free!) is required. Please send your name and email to Wayne Messer wrmesser@gmail.com so we can get a count and send you the details for attending.  


There will also be a Region 21 Board meeting at 9:00 a.m. Central Time (8:00 a.m. Mountain Time) and a Region 21 Business meeting following Bonnie’s presentation. Everyone is invited to attend and participate in both meetings. This year the business meeting includes the election of a first-year director. Please consider volunteering for this position.

Allan Ensminger Iris Photos Needed

‘Batik’

Allan Ensminger of Lincoln, Nebraska, a Region 21 hybridizer, was known for his work on variegated, broken color irises. Among these was the 1992 Knowlton Medal winner ‘Batik’ and the IB ‘Hubbub’. In 2007 he won the Bennett C. Jones Award for Outstanding Median Hybridizing from the Median Iris Society. Other awards include the AIS Distinguished Service Medal in 1983 and the AIS Hybridizer Award in 1994.

You can see photos of his irises in the Iris Encyclopedia starting with this page. That is of many of them; there are a considerable number that do not have photos. To help remedy that, this is a page listing his irises that need photos.

Can you help provide photos? You can either add them to the appropriate page in the Iris Encyclopedia or contact me and I will be glad to add them. Wayne Messer wrmesser@gmail.com .

Thank you!

Please Vote in the Tall Bearded Iris Symposium

A reminder that there is still time to vote in the 2020 Tall Bearded Iris Symposium. The ballot was included with the Spring 2020 Irises Bulletin and is also available online here (PDF). Everyone, member or not, is eligible to vote for up to 25 of the 458 TBs on the ballot.

Your votes should reach the Region 21 RVP (Wayne Messer – wrmesser@gmail.com) by August 1st.  A list of your choices and their numbers would be great.

Complete details on how to vote are available. You can also see results from previous years voting there.

Thank you for your participation.

Region 21’s Kris Jurik Featured in Better Homes & Gardens

The May 2020 issue of Better Homes & Gardens features our own Kris Jurik for her peonies.  Many of you will remember that some of the peonies were in bloom along with the irises in the 2017 AIS Convention.

You can see the article on the Better Homes and Garden website.

Thank you to Carolyn Lingenfelter for calling this article to our attention.

Region 21 Covid-19 Related Announcements

The pandemic has caused many cancellations and changes in Region 21 and the American Iris Society:

  • The Region 21 Fall Meeting has been cancelled.  Thank you to everyone in the Sioux Empire Iris Society who has been working to prepare for this meeting.
  • Region 21 Fall Board Meeting – Plans are being made to meet via video conferencing this fall.
  • The Region 21 newsletter has been temporarily suspended.  Updates for Region 21 will be posted to the Region 21 website.
  • All Region 21 clubs have cancelled their iris shows.  Anyone wishing to can send pictures of their garden for inclusion in a Region 21 virtual garden tour to be posted on our website.
  • Because judges training opportunities are extremely limited, judges needing hours in 2020 have had their eligibility extended for one year.  Those that have satisfied requirements will be advanced. Judges will receive credit for any judges training already completed.
  • Kelly Norris has stepped down as Region 21 Judges Training Chair.  Until a new chair is named, all records and questions should be sent to me.
  • The AIS 2020 Convention, three mini-conventions, and all Regional Spring Meetings have been cancelled.
  • The Garden Awards voting for 2020 has also been cancelled due to limited opportunities to view the eligible irises in gardens.

Other AIS changes will be posted, as they occur, on the Cancellations page, the AIS website News & Events page, and in the AIS electronic newsletter, News & Notes.

Check the Region 21 website for ongoing announcements and updates.

Wayne Messer
AIS Region 21 RVP
wrmesser@gmail.com