The Region 21 Spring Meeting this year is the Whirlwind Garden Tour which is a one day dress rehearsal for the AIS 2017 National Convention. Details have been mailed to Region 21 members. In case you did not receive it or would like more copies, 2016 AIS REGION 21 Brochure is the PDF of the brochure.
Hope to see you here May 21st and next year to enjoy the irises and all the great irisarians!
Region 21 has 6 Clubs located in Iowa, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Manitoba. You can find your closest Club on this map. Or see these in a live Google Map at BatchGeo.
These are:
See the Who We Are page for links for some of these and the AIS Region 21 Affiliates page for contact information.
‘Blue Rhythm’
This is Region 21’s 65th year; so before it’s over a quick look back. Region 21 was formed with Iowa, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota on January 1st, 1950. Iowa and Nebraska had been part of Region 18 which had been formed from Region 9 in 1947. Region 9 had been Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska. When Region 18 was formed, only Illinois remained as Region 9. Then in 2010, Region 21 was expanded to include the provinces of NWT, Nunavut, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.
The first Regional Vice-President was Mrs. Ralph E. Ricker, 1516 Ross St., Sioux City, Iowa, according to the list of RVPs in the Bulletin of the American Iris Society, January, 1950. 1950 was also the year the AIS Spring Convention was held in Sioux City, Iowa and the year that Agnes Whiting of Mapleton, Iowa won the Dykes Medal with ‘Blue Rhythm’.
Thank you to everyone who has made Region 21 great over the years and to all of you who are helping to continue the tradition.
Region 21’s own Gary White was elected AIS president at the Board of Directors meeting in Omaha. A number of Lincoln Iris Society and Region members were there to help celebrate his election and installation. Congratulations to Gary and thank you for your service.
Some photos from the festivities. Jim Morris and Gary. Gary and Linda Wilkie. Gary and Ron Crampton who made the centerpiece shown in the last photo. It was made from irises reblooming at the time.
Thank you to the Greater Omaha Iris Society and Linda Wilkie for organizing and hosting this outstanding meeting.
The Sioux Empire Iris Society is hosting this year’s Region 21 Fall Meeting in Sioux Falls, SD. Join us for Judges Training in the morning and afternoon, the business meeting, the evening banquet and an iris auction. Also, please bring rhizomes from your own gardens or club sales for a bargain table.
In case you did not receive the notice and registration form, here is the Region 21 Fall 2015 notice as a PDF for you. So send your registration soon and make your room reservations.
Hope to see you there.
Region 21 is hosting the 2017 AIS Convention in Des Moines, Iowa May 23-27, 2017. Our next planning meeting for this is Saturday, June 6th. It will be a Region 21 business review and AIS 2017 Convention Organizational Meeting which is open to all interested AIS members.
Details: Saturday, June 6
Lunch at 1:00 p.m. in Trellis, Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden (group seating, pay your own). Menu (changes monthly): http://www.dmbotanicalgarden.com/visit-us/dine/
Meeting at 2:00 p.m. in the Walsh Room, Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden
Hope to see you there.
With the AIS 2015 Convention in Portland, we are not having a Region 21 Spring meeting. We hope many will be able to take advantage of the Portland Convention to enjoy irises and fellow irisarians. Immediately following it is the Siberian/Species 2015 convention.
For those of us not attending, you can sample some of the gardens that will be visited with these videos. And everyone can start thinking about 2017 when we will be hosting the AIS 2017 Convention in Des Moines!
You probably do not need this; because you are already here. However, it’s something to share with your friends: The Region 21 website has a new address. It is now aisregion21.org (with or without a www prefix). The AIS list of Regional Websites has been updated; but, there may be other sources still having the old address (which was dot com rather than dot org). You can help us by letting us know where they are or updating them yourselves.
Thank you for encouraging everyone to get the new address.
It’s that time again. The Region 21 Fall Meeting is approaching rapidly. The Region 21 Fall Meeting this year is in Ames, Iowa on August 8th and 9th. You should have received your registration form already. If you did not, here is an AIS Region 21 Flyer (PDF).
We have a great lineup of speakers for you. And following the banquet will be the irises auction. So send your registration soon and make your room reservations.
Saturday morning August 9th from 10 to 12 is the Public Iris Sale!
Thank you to the Lincoln Iris Society for hosting the 2014 Region 21 Spring Convention. There was a great turnout. The weather cooperated! And we toured 6 gardens. We saw lots of blooms and learned about garden judging from Judy Keisling and judging historic irises from Gary White.
Thank you to these irisarians for opening their gardens to us:
You can read more about these 
gardens and the meeting in the upcoming Regional Newsletter where we have six authors each reviewing one of the gardens.
AIS Region 21 