Once I discovered the iris I was very happy as it gave me that bloom season I had been trying to find with those extra early daylilies. Honestly about the only great thing about that daylily is that I am able to post on May 23 that I have a daylily bloom. But otherwise forget it. Those few extra earlies are in a row in front of the extra lates in the front yard. Sooner or later I will get the urge and find more extra lates. Then I will replace the really nerdy extra earlies and take their spots. Meantime they stay. Christine- I have no secret with the Dutch Iris. I planted them all last fall, they came up this spring. I am hoping they come back each year but that remains to be seen. I do know that I plan to get more to plant in other places this fall.

These don't look like Dutch iris. One possibility is the bulbs died out.

Any of the usual bulb sources....Van Engelens, Scheepers, Brent and Becky's, Brecht's, M&Z, etc. But it is getting late in the season and some places will be sold out by now.

Some Dutch iris are better at persisting than others (try the blue and the blue/bronze one), and they are fine over summer as long as they have good drainage. Supposedly they are not tasty to gophers.. but I have had them disappear faster in the open garden than in wire lined beds. It helps to divide them in Fall as they tend to form a clump of small bulbs around the original. I. reticulata and its relatives is an annual like Hybrid Tulips here in 9/10 - its just not cold enough in Winter to simulate their native conditions - from Brian Mathew: Iris reticulata and its relatives are mountain plants native to western Asia, and thus used to hard winters. I have seen reticulatas growing in areas of Turkey and Iran where the winter temperatures certainly dip regularly to -25°F, although normally with good snow cover. Winter hardiness is therefore not in question. The success or otherwise of these delightful spring bulbs lies more in the summer conditions, as the bulbs like to be dormant and almost dry from early summer through to the autumn, when root growth commences once more.