if i understand.. you like a few zinc plates.. but you do not want a graveyard????

how about maps???

some peeps used to take plastic knives ... sandpaper them a bit to roughen them.. and then use a simple lead pencil .. as lead has a half life of a couple million years.. the trick is the stick the written part in the ground to avoid weathering ...

mapping can also be done with a digital camera ... just take the time.. after you upload the pix.. to use your photo editor to write the names on the pix ...

ken

Your suggestions are all good, but what I'm specifically looking for right now is something that I can use to write on the foliage itself, right at the base of the fan, that will give help me identify particular cultivars that I want to keep, move, or delete altogether.

Susan

I usually try to divide mine by late June at least & often write on the leaves just to make sure I get the right ones. My iris are planted to close together. I have a marker called Marks a Lot that works well, but I think any permanent marker will last quite a while, providing you aren't planning to divide in fall. My problem is not so much how long the marker lasts, but if the leaf will last. I don't write on the "mother" rhizome, the leaves on the mother tend to wither & maybe die back more than the side rhizomes.

i use sharpies or ballpoint pens to write on foliage ... both last for most of the season ... if the leaf does .... i sometimes write up high.. on one of the inner more leaves.. in case the oldest outer ones decay ...

i have also used landscape flags ... write on those.. and they call your attention back to which plants need work ...

ken

copy/pate this link too:

http://www.lowes.com/SearchCatalogDisplay?Ntt=marking+flags&langId=-1&storeId=10151&catalogId=10051&N=0

Here is a link that might be useful: link

Thanks all. I will see if my Sharpies will help me.
Susan

I've heard of using paint pens, the kind you get at the craft store. The person said write at the base, on the innermost leaf.

bkay

i dabbled in paint pens.. what a mess ... and once the paint dries on the tip .. thats it for the whole pen.. no matter how much paint is left in the tube ..

worked great when i was labeling 1500 pots to move to a new house ... 10 years later.. i am still seeing my pots floating around various places i donated them to ...

would be a total waste of money for a one day plant marking project.. IMHO ...

ken

I use Sharpies -- they have several widths of points and the ink holds up. The question is, will the leaf last all season?

I also use the little zinc labels stuck next to the plant. But Ken is right, in winter it does look like a small cemetery!

I plant bulbs in between the irises for Spring color---crocuses, grape hyacinths, daffodils (gave up on tulips due to deer). When I plant these, I stick a sturdy short twig right above them. Then I know where the bulbs are hiding, and the twigs are invisible from a couple of feet away. I am tired of deciding to plant another bulb "right here" and shoving the trowel right into a daffodil I put there last year!

I use a sharpie on the rhizom itself and its last all season. In our moist climate the leaves just put out to much moisture to hold the ink more than a couple of months. By august when I am ready to divide there is just not enough left to read. I also find it easier to make a list of plant names and mark them by thier number on the list some of the names are so big its just hard to fit them on the plant. I usually mark one by name or use a marker then mark the rest that are the same by the number. I got that idea by a iris farm I visited near Shreiners a few years ago. They had a wooden marker with the name and number then the rhuzoms them self were marked with that number.