LICI Holds Last Winter 2022-2023 Iris Rescue Event

January 6, 2023 Laplace, La.

The Louisiana Iris Conservation Initiative (LICI) held its last iris rescue of the 2022-2023 rescue and planting season on Thursday, January 5, 2023. The Goldring/Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life (ISJL), organized a visit of forty 8th-grade and high school students from Houston for a tour of Jewish life and history in New Orleans, which also included two half-days of service work with Common Ground Relief, a local non-profit that specializes in marsh restoration work. Common Ground Relief included LICI's iris rescue event in the planned activities Thursday morning for the group. In addition, a Boy Scout troop from Hammond, La came out to help as LICI volunteers.

The volunteers are shown getting ready to start work.

The site where the iris rescue was held is located in a rural area west of New Orleans an Interstate interchange. Its zoned for commercial development, is permitted, and is for sale. The owner has encouraged us to get the irises out to use in our iris restoration projects.

The volunteers are seen working hard digging irises.

Typically LICI plants irises from their summer and fall rescue events into containers at the group's iris-holding area in New Orleans, where they grow and strengthened up in containers for two or three months before being planted out into the swamps and marshes. However, since it is late in the season and the irises are in full winter growth mode, these irises can be planted directly into the Louisiana Iris Conservation Initiative's iris restoration projects, according to LICI's Gary Salathe. "We have plans to have all of the irises we have rescued at this event planted within two weeks," he said.

The group was able to collect 2,500 I. giganticaerulea species of the Louisiana iris. The irises were put into temporary storage at LICI's New Orleans iris holding area on Friday. They will be used in their iris restoration projects over the next few weeks.

LICI Begins Winter 2022-2023 Louisiana Iris Planting at Bayou Sauvage National Urban Wildlife Refuge

December 19, 2022 New Orleans, La.

The Louisiana Iris Conservation Initiative began its winter Louisiana iris plantings at the Bayou Sauvage National Urban Wildlife Refuge in eastern New Orleans on December 19, 2022. A group of volunteers from the University of South Dakota planted over 400 Louisiana irises and 33 bald cypress trees along the refuge boardwalk near the display platform. Common Ground Relief hosted the student-volunteers during the week as they did service activities in the New Orleans area.

The volunteers are seen unloading the irises at the Bayou Sauvage refuge on the morning of Monday December 19, 2022.

The Bayou Sauvage refuge is home to one of LICI's most important multi-year iris restoration projects. They also have a significant tree-planting project there in partnership with Common Ground Relief. Monday's iris planting was the first of LICI's 2022 winter planting season at the refuge. It will be followed with multiple smaller plantings over the next few weeks. The non-profit's goal is to get about 1,500 irises in the ground at the refuge before the end of January. Monday's planting helped get that effort kicked off.

In addition to the Louisiana irises, the group planted 33 one-gallon potted bald cypress trees and installed nutria guards on 50 previously planted cypress trees.

Gary Salathe, with LICI, explained, "Our iris restoration project at the refuge had a setback in 2021 when extreme rains in late spring raised the water level at the irises too high. We lost quite a few irises in part because just as the water level was dropping, Hurricane Ida hit the area, flooding the iris area all over again. We started replanting areas last winter where some of the irises were killed off, and this planting is a continuation of that effort."

The Louisiana irises shown as they are blooming in April of 2021 at the Bayou Sauvage refuge boardwalk display platform.

The I. giganticaerulea species of the Louisiana iris from LICI's iris rescue program was used for the planting. Salathe said that they hope the iris plantings they did last winter and the plantings they will be doing this winter will get the number of irises back to where they were during the spring of 2021.

The volunteers are shown planting irises at the Bayou Sauvage refuge on

December 19, 2022.

Part of the work that LICI did during the fall of 2021 at the refuge was planting 6,000 Louisiana iris seeds in areas along the length of the old Bayou Sauvage, which is where their project is located. "We weren't sure if those seeds had germinated because the area went into an extended dry period that lasted into the spring of 2022. However, we were very excited to see for the first time many of the seeds coming up as new irises in the few areas we worked in on Monday. This could be a game-changer for the project's success if many of the seeds survived and have now started growing", Salathe said.

Some of the irises sprouting from seeds can be seen in the foreground of the photo.

LICI ranked the Bayou Sauvage refuge boardwalk as the second best location to see wild Louisiana irises blooming in their native habitat on their 2022 Iris Viewing Locations Interactive Map that was released last spring. Salathe says it is very likely that it will either hold that position for 2023 or it may move up to the number-one spot for the first time. "If many of the 6,000 seeds we planted in 2021 have germinated, the boardwalk will most certainly take the number one spot for 2024 because that will be the first year that these irises will bloom", Salathe added.

LICI Completes 2022 Iris Planting at St. Bernard State Park

December 9, 2022 Braithwaite, LA

The Louisiana Iris Conservation Initiative (LICI) completed its Louisiana iris planting for the 2022 winter planting season at St. Bernard State Park on December 9, 2022. A small group of volunteers from LICI and Common Ground Relief dug up 500 irises from LICI's iris holding area in the morning and planted all 500 at the state park in the afternoon. "On yet another unseasonably warm day for December, the group worked hard to get the job done," says LICI's president, Gary Salathe, who was the project leader.

Some of the volunteers from Common Ground Relief are seen digging the irises from their containers at the LICI iris holding area in New Orleans on the morning of the iris planting at St. Bernard State Park.

The I. giganticaerulea species of the Louisiana iris from the LICI's iris rescue program was used for the planting. Many of the irises were rescued from sites where they were threatened with destruction this past spring and summer.

This iris planting continues LICI's multi-year iris restoration project, which began at the state park with its first planting in 2020. There are some I. giganticaerulea irises naturally growing in the park, but they are not in locations where they can be easily seen by visitors to the park.

The drainage area is shown in the photo where the irises were planted.

The irises on December 9th were planted in a drainage area that passes through the park's picnic area directly behind a large pavilion. The picnic area is heavily used during the spring when the irises will be in bloom. " We hope that the iris plantings we are doing at the park will help attract more visitors to the park when the irises are in bloom, which will help to achieve the goals of the park and our goals to increase the public's awareness of this special native plant. A true win/win deal", Salathe says.

Josh Benitez, Co-director of Common Ground Relief, is in the foreground of the photo planting some of the 500 Louisiana irises a group of volunteers planted at St. Bernard State Park on December 9, 2022.

The irises planted in 2020 are shown blooming in April of 2022 at LICI's iris restoration project at St. Bernard State Park.