Since they've been in place for many years, I think you will find it
difficult to remove just some of the rhizomes in a patchwork fashion. They
will be very intertwined, and it will be more trouble than it's worth to try
and leave a few. Better to take them all out, and fork over the bed and add
some compost. Replant the bigger rhizomes for your best shot at a good
display next year.

Cheers,
Sue

--

Zone 6, South-central PA

"Gwen Morse" wrote in message
I used to get many stalks of iris blooms, but, in the past two years
I've only gotten one "stem" of blooms per season. I think it might be
that they're too crowded.

Is there anything special I should do to separate them? Just dig out
"all" of them except one or two rhizomes? Should I leave a clump and
then free a section of a certain size, so, I effectively 'patchwork'
in blank areas?

What I'd like to do is remove the least amount of rhizomes for the
most amount of blooming return next year. If that's all of them, then,
that's fine, but, I don't want to pull out all of them unless that's
really the best choice.