So, I've been repeatedly told that herbaceous peonies are one of those plants that absolutely don't do well in warm climates, and therefore I shouldn't try. Especially by my mother. The combination, back when 'my garden' was actually 'my mother's front lawn', of an expensive plant and the perception that it was unlikely to survive the oppressive summers, was enough to keep me from trying.
Then a few weeks ago my boss and I went and picked up a load of manure from a woman out of town and I saw her garden... She had an entire row of furiously blooming peonies. They were right up against the fence of one of her paddocks, in full sun, and they looked exquisite and healthy and so very, very distracting.
I didn't have the opportunity to ask her how she did it, but her success seems to be a firm rebuttal of my mother's disbelief in peonies. Any advice on how to keep these gorgeous flowers alive and blooming well in hot, humid, occasionally flooded/drought-struck central North Carolina? I've been inspired (meaning tempted, of course,) but I'd still rather get some advice from more experienced gardeners before dipping into my bank account on this one.
Peonies in central NC?
I put mine on the east side of my house in North Texas. It isn't totally humid but it sure is hot. They bloomed this year.
I was told they probably wouldn't but in Dallas where it rains more and is more humid they get big and bloom every year.
Food and water. Feed now for next year's blooms, trying to remember what i used, I think some epsom salts and some azalea food and a bunch of coffee grounds, and maybe some cottonseed meal. In 2017. And they were put in the ground fall 2016. they finally bloomed April 2018. one bloom per plant.
I dug up 5 from near a foundation in Arlington TX, a single stem on each.
Hrm. So what you're saying is, it's a combination of intensive dedication and a little bit of hit-and-miss. Maybe there are varieties better suited to warm weather?
Another option I've been made aware of is tree peony, as they apparently do better in hot climates (like Australia.) The difficulty then is that they're even more expensive, and much harder to find in the US.
Because mine are orphans I don't know What variety they are. I ordered one from Michigan bulb years ago, it died
Ouch. My condolences. And, that's why I'm here looking for advice.
My grandmother has a gorgeous peony in her yard up north... She sort of raised her eyebrow at me when I asked what variety it was, and said that she'd inherited it from an aunt. Decades ago. So again, no idea. I wonder how many of those are floating around? Really old plants, especially things like peonies, that have been passed down, but no-one really knows exactly what they are.
Heirloom, your grandmothers. No clue on mine. Visit neighbors that have them and ask?
Lots of peonies grow in zone 7. I just published an article here that names several that grow in zone 8.
https://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/heirloom-peonies/
And are you familiar with the Sarah Duke Garden? It's near Raleigh. It has many peonies. I photographed them when I was there. It's in 7b.
Go for it!
Donna
Really? I go to Duke Gardens every once in a while, but I've never noticed the peonies. Maybe I went in the wrong season, or took a different path. It's a big place. Next time I go, I'll ask.
Thanks for the link, Donna. It looks promising. I appreciate the encouragement.
And then I found out it's the season (off-season, rather) for peony roots to be on sale and splurged and bought six. *mildly shame-faced* I did at least take into consideration Donna's recommendations on variety.
No, Summer, I'm wrong. The peonies were at Raulston Arboretum when they held their "Gala in the Garden", which always takes place in the first week of May. Then I would go to Sarah Duke Garden and take pictures, but it was mostly of roses. At least I think that's right. Our peonies here bloom at the end of May and the beginning of June.
Here is a link to the Raulston peonies, but I distinctly remember the huge double 'Red Charm'.
https://jcra.ncsu.edu/resources/photographs/plants-results.php?serial=109209
I clearly remember 'Red Charm' in bloom. A lot of the peonies were single but there were many doubles.
Wow, those are gorgeous. Are those all named varieties?
I wonder how much variation there is in seed from any given plant. Are peonies more inclined to produce offspring that are simpler than the parent plants, or do they frequently retain interesting genetic quirks? I'm wondering about quirks like color flecks in the petals or double blooms. And, do they ever throw out complete wild cards the way dahlias do, producing blooms with a completely new form or color?
This isn't really on topic for this thread, obviously. The thought just occurred to me as I was looking at the Raulston Arboretum pictures, and saw that many of them were singles with similar coloring.
They are all named varieties.
To my knowledge peonies don't throw off sports like roses do (all the time). I have several rose sports that are different colors or more or less double. They are usually spontaneous, and they are absolutely wonderful, because they have the same great qualities as the original. I have never known peonies to do that. The variations that you see are, I believe, stuff done deliberately by hybridizers in order to patent and make money from a peony already in existence. I won't name names, but there is a big one who does this all the time. I personally love heirloom peonies, and want to make sure they are around, and I think it's a shame that the market for them is diluted by inferior versions of the greats.
But then that's my bias. I am not interested in intersections or peonies in weird colors. They are very expensive and trendy, and people tell me that I MUST have them. I started my garden life as an heirloom lover. I am growing from seed Trumpet lilies that have gone out of commerce (orienpet lilies, which are oriental trumpet crosses, have pushed out the pure trumpets). Some orienpets are lovely, like 'Anastasia'. But a lot of them, to my eye, are simply vulgar. My new pet peeve is "double lilies", which I think are absolutely hideous.
I think that the predominance of singles is due to the fact that many singles do well in the warmer zones. But I remember a former member (Steve Fort Worth) who had a huge number of peonies, some of them quite rambunctious. He and I used to correspond. He was really my biggest inspiration in growing peonies. He had a billion of them. And he was like a textbook on which doubles grew well in the south.
Oh, I see where you're coming from. Lots of the dahlias that are popular because they're unusual, with actual stripes and such, are things I don't bother with because I find them distractingly weird. Heirlooms are often the most beautiful plants in the garden.
I just wonder about the genetics and probability area because my big thing is propagation. I love to grow all my perennials from seed, partly because I do occasionally get that one odd-ball that doesn't match the rest. For me, it's so much more satisfying to see my plants blooming when I took the time to personally rear them from dormant embryo to thriving adult plant. It also helps me ensure that everything I grow is well suited to my climate. My seedling/trial garden is always a bit of everything.
Too bad Steve from Fort Worth has gone,but then again I already have beautiful orphan lilies and I'm running out of yard.
I like your observation that things are sometimes popular because they are weird. And also expensive. And also quite ugly.
I am a propagation nut. I have grown thousands of plants from seed. If it's expensive and doesn't last a long time (digitalis mertonensis is a prime example) I grow it. I have grown balloon flowers in white, blue and perlemutter. I also grow lots of annuals. Some of them you only have to grow once. Start verbena bonariensis and put it out, and afterwards you just have to pull the excess, which is fine because the rootball is tiny. Have you seen what catalogs charge for that? I love growing double feverfew and arabis caucausica and heuchera 'Firefly'. It's really neat if you want a border plant like fragaria vesca reugen and can grow 20 and put them all around your property.
Easy on the wallet too. Good for me because I love sumptuousness.
This message was edited Jun 9, 2018 9:49 PM
what is the pink trumpeting flower in your first picture DonnaMack? (I have a refrigerator shelf full of seeds, some of which need to hit dirt soon)
The flowers look like foxglove... Except, my foxgloves have always had fuzzy, slightly rounder leaves? Oh, right, its mertonensis. Donna said what it was up at the top of her post. It's very pretty, anyway. And the one on the far right is an... heuchera? Another plant I've been wistfully glancing at in passing for, um, a while. I need to stop picking up new plants.
This message was edited Jun 9, 2018 9:21 PM
Yep, it is mertonensis. I stopped buying them because you get them as first year plants and you have to overwinter them, which I don't find successful. But if I grow them from seed and put the basal foliage in the ground I tend to get 75 to 80% of the plants. I do think plants you grow from seed tend to be stronger (and a heck of a lot cheaper!!!)
Yes, that is heuchera 'Firefly'. Over the years I kept buying heucheras for increasingly large amounts of money and they all died. I personally like ones with red flowers. I went to JL Hudson' website (Watchdog 30 company) a good ten years ago and found this:
—Heuchera sanguinea Firefly. (100) HEU-20F. Packet: $2.50
1/4 gram: $7.50
Click for photos » HeucheraFirefly.jpg (108180 bytes) Heuchera sanguinea Firefly.jpg (113134 bytes)
'CORAL BELLS'. Dark scarlet, nodding, bell-shaped 1/2" flowers in open clusters, on delicate stems to 2 feet, May to July. Hardy perennial with rosettes of roundish scalloped leaves. SW U.S. Zone 3. This is an improved deep scarlet strain. Germinates in 2 - 3 weeks.
It's still there.
Years ago! It's a surface seeder. I got a bumper crop of about seven, which I put next to alchemilla mollis and under a cornus alternafolia (in full western sun!) along with a peony.
Better yet, when I moved, I dug some up and put them in pots. Tough guys. This bedraggled specimen in the third picture became the plant in the fourth picture within weeks.
And if they heave or decline you can take incredibly weakened one, tear off the dead part, stick the rest in the ground in compost and they start growing again.
The last picture shows the seedlings.
I probably have ten. And just for the record, JLH has some amazing seed, and unlike a lot of other catalogs they are frank about how difficult things are to grow. But many seeds are in fact surface germinaters at about 70 degrees. I have grown hundreds of plants, and when you are growing perennials, you can save a ton of money and have as many as you want! And often of plants you can't buy for reasonable amounts of money anywhere.
Oh, and speaking of peonies, I just read that another peony I have is zone 8 hardy. I was sent three by mistake. FABULOUS. It has to be staked, but it has lots of secondary buds. It was my first peony to bloom, and is pumping out flowers about three weeks after starting to bloom. Great scent.
70 degrees is tough to achieve in North Texas, but very interesting information, thank you
Not under shop lights indoors!
... It's seventy degrees in full shade here, easily. It was news a week or two ago when the nighttime temperature dropped all the way to sixty. My trouble will be keeping it down.
Thanks for the recommendation of JL Hudson, Donna, I'll be looking them up.
Your peony is, as usual, gorgeous.
My air conditioner struggles to get down to 79 in the afternoon, lol
Aha! So, I got more details from my grandmother about her peony, and I was apparently remembering things a bit mixed up. She says it's actually my grandpa's. So far as *verifiable* history goes on this one, my grandpa Larry transplanted it to its current location from his mother's garden when he sold her house after she died. He recalls it having been in his mother's yard ever since she moved in there, around 1948, and has the impression that it was brought there from his grandparents' farm in Belding before that.
So, bearing in mind that my grandfather is increasingly confused as his age catches up with him, the particular plant is definitely at least seventy years old, probably more. My grandma also says that it hasn't been touched since it was moved to its current location. Since that spot has become rather shady, it hasn't bloomed as well as it once did in a few years, so I'm welcome to dig it up when I visit in August and take a few divisions. And, of course, move it to a sunnier spot for her while I'm at it... (Happy dance!!!)
I did want to ask for opinions on the possible variety, though. She says it blooms large and white and is 'extremely fragrant'. I feel like that description sounds familiar, maybe? 'Eden's Perfume' came to mind, but that's pink, and of course much too young... 'Festiva Maxima' was introduced in, I want to say, the 1850s? So that could be it. I'll ask her whether its a double or single. That would probably help. I remember it as a double.
Edit: I just actually counted the generations involved in that bit of family history... That peony came from my great-great grandparents (probably.)
This message was edited Jun 12, 2018 1:33 PM
Donna, have you looked at Old House Gardens in Michigan? They carry only varieties of flowering perennials, including peonies, that could be considered 'heirloom' depending somewhat on your definition, and list the date of introduction of every variety. I've used information from them a couple of times when setting up 'historic' gardens. Mainly, the goal is just to only plant things that may realistically have been in the area at the time the plot is meant to be imitating. I'm sure you've seen a few gardens like that around historic houses and cemeteries and whatnot. There's a lot of them in Hillsborough, so I've helped work on a couple. (It's so much easier when there's an original gardener's journal to work from...)
https://oldhousegardens.com/AboutUs
This message was edited Jun 12, 2018 1:44 PM
Summer, I go WAYYYY back with Old House Gardens. At least from the year 2000. If you look at their reviews, you will see my comments. I have purchased lilies and daffodils (I particularly love 'Mrs. Backhouse') and peonies and bulbs like leucojum 'Gravetye Giant'. I got my Mrs. FDR from them, as well as one of my Festiva Maximas and Phillippe Rivoire.
They are a great source. Their daffodil bulbs are frightening. The biggest double nosed puppies I have ever seen. I actually had the pleasure of meeting Scott, the owner, many, many years ago. He just retired.
They are not inexpensive, but their quality is absolutely unsurpassed.
I have three Festiva Maximas. It was my first peony. I just love it.
Donna
I might have to check out Old House Gardens.
A really good time to check them out is at the end of each season when they are blowing out their stuff. I ordered 5 discounted martagon lilies and was sent EIGHT!!!!!
Get on their email list. Then you will know when the sales are coming up. They just finished the sale for spring bulbs.
Their peonies, by the way, are very standard prices - mostly $18 to $22, but the roots are great. The best peonies I have ever received were from two companies in Canada - the owners of them have unfortunately retired. I find that my Canadian peonies Bloom the first year with multiple flowers and need staking in the second year. The roots are huge. Perhaps having fewer buyers means that they are more mature. Also, when you order peonies or lilies from Canada you have to pay $15 for a special certificate, so a small order makes no sense. I ordered five peonies, which would have made it worthwhile alone, but then a friend went in with me for peonies and lilies and insisted on splitting the certificate. Also, the peonies were true to name. Three different American companies sent me the wrong peonies. The first time I ordered three FM's I was sent a FM, a Kansas (no to my taste) and an Ann Cousins. So instead of getting three identical peonies I got three different ones. When I tried to order one more FM from the same company I got Lady Alexandra Duff. Ordered four FM in all, and got one. I was so disappointed at the disjointed look, and getting peonies I didn't like, that I left the errors at my former home, taking only a handful of peonies.
Another company from which I ordered three red singles sent me three pink doubles. Yet another company sent me Coral Charm (I am not a fan of Coral peonies) instead of Mrs. FDR. They did subsequently send me the correct, insisting I was wrong until I sent them a photo.
The reason I have 20 peonies is because of the errors. And since I find American peonies typically do not produce flowers the first year, I waited two years to find I had the wrong plants. I moved errors to my back yard in a fairly sunny spot. After all, when all of your peonies are white, shades of pink or red, 'Coral Charm' makes it look like you are colorblind. On the other hand, the erroneous Edulis Superbas were so lovely I moved them to the front. All three. Stunning peony. Extremely floriferous. Secondary buds extend the bloom season. It does need staking. That doesn't bother me, but I know it troubles some people, and I do understand. I just disagree!!!!!! LOL!
Wow, all good to know
Sorry about the way I babble on...
No, you're fine, Donna. The way you babble on is informative. If you babbled on and had nothing interesting to say I'd be more exasperated.
All good things to learn. My grand.other had a peony bush in Michigan on the farm they sold in 1970, that is the extent of my peony knowledge., so I don't have.much to contribute.
Just FYI,
I am getting a modest secondary bloom from some of my peonies. Festiva Maxima, Mrs. FDR and Edulis Superba, in particular. It is really cool to get blooms three weeks after the first ones because even the smaller buds are so big.
Neat