Everything you wanted to know about the iris borer.
This is unhealthy looking foliage. Obviously. I cringed when I saw this forming. This is my next door neighbor's yard. I love her dearly, but she knows squat about plants. She lets me come over and dig as I see fit. Let's remember that I have 5 children and barely have time to go to the bathroom let alone garden two plots.
Cathy Luter, look away!!
The borers GORGE themselves on the iris tubers. Then they eventually turn into moths and lay their eggs in the old iris leaves in the fall. Then in the spring the cycle starts all over again: they hatch out, make pinhole marks in the leaves and eat their way down to the tubers again. So by late July you have pretty shabby looking plants. Much of the tubers are mush after the borers have tunneled through.
Even Adam doesn't want to touch them, which really tells you how gross and ugly the little demons are. But my kind hearted son wouldn't kill them, he used the knife to flick them into his bug cage. (Don't worry, I'll squish them after he goes to bed tonight. He would probably cry if he watched.)
All the discard really should be burned. Death to the iris borer!!!
Here are the salvaged borer-free pieces. They are soaking in a bucket of bleach water right now. I feel like I should bath in bleach water after touching the things.
