By Kay M. Phiel, Gwinnett County Master Gardener In early May, 2011, a friend and I took a Road Scholar/Elderhostle program to the Black Hills, Bad Lands, and Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. We were surprised to see a Prairie Homestead out in the very desolate-looking Bad Lands area of western South Dakota. It was raining fairly heavily that day so we didn’t explore as much as we might have. I picked up a brochure just before we reboarded the bus and was surprised to read a portion on Iris Gardens. We did not actually see the iris’ when we were there, as they were in another area, but I thought you might find the brochure interesting. Iris Gardens (Retyped from a brochure about a Prairie Homestead in the Bad Lands, Philip, South Dakota) “When the first Homesteaders came to this area many of them brought iris plants from…
