Howard Shockey was a member of the Albuquerque Aril and Iris Society.  He won the  American Iris Society Hybridizer Award in 2000 and first ever Region 23 Hybridizer’s Award.  Howard’s record in the hybridizing arena is legend.  While he made many notable and award-winning iris crosses, he is most well known for his dabbling in the world of Aril and Arilbred irises.  His introductions have garnered everything from Exhibition Certificates to the coveted American Iris Society awards, most notably the William Mohr Medal for Arilbreds, and the C.G. White Medal for Arils.

Howard’s work on arilbreds was cutting edge. During his time, he set new standards of growth in the OGB+ class, winning the Clarence G. White medal three times during his hybridizing career. He was in the process of redefining the OGB class with the advent of aril characteristics in this class unheard of even in the OGB+ class as recently as 10 years before his death.   Howard’s first real iris love was the pure arils, and he was very fortunate in the early days to have most of the species available to him that we can only dream about now.

Howard was a mentor to Pete McGrath who to this day hybridizers in Arilbreds Irises.  This article was pulled from Pete’s honorium to Howard Shockey in the Aril Society Yearbook, 1995.

Pete said “In my visits to his garden, I marveled at the incredible oncocyclus and oncogelia that his 40 years of hybridizing have produced.  He had some almost white with blue seedlings, pure white with purple signals, pure white with orange signals.  He had incredible amoenas, as well as many flowers that were veined and stippled but typically much more beautiful than their parents….totally redefined aril flowers.  Though this area of veining and stippling was not Howard’s favorite area, he had fine, fine plants of this type.  Some of his flowers were haunting in their shading and coloring… and all of them are works of art.”