Fortnight Lily - Butterfly Iris

One of the more common accent plants nowadays is the Fortnight Lily (Morea iriodes). This perennial has iris-like foliage with flowers either white with purple and yellow markings or light yellow.

One of the most common methods to clean them up is cutting them to the ground when they start to look trashy. This is an easy way to force them to regrow but with one strong disadvantage. The flower spikes are persistant if you leave them uncut. What this means is that you want to clean up the old flower spikes but do not cut them down for the most bloom.

By leaving them you can increase the amount of bloom 2 to 3 times.

When they get too big or too crowded you need to either dig the entire plant up, divide and replant only a good portion or if it is still in good condition cut portions out and leave a good portion behind. This should be done during warm weather to allow new root development.

Ther are two selections that are becoming available. Unfortunately they often go by the same name, "Lemon Drop". Our favorite is a bicolor (yellow) selection that we call "Scenic Sunrise". It is a deeper yellow and is about 1/3 smaller than most bicolor morea. We have plantings of it in our front planter as well as in one of our parking lot planters. We think it is distinctly better.

The other is a white morea that has yellow markings only and has also been sold as Lemon Drop.