Peony Season

Joan Shaw

Looking (with longing) toward spring

Paeonia lactiflora 'Duchesse de Nemours' (Melanie Shaw)

The Tuesday before Thanksgiving, we were hit with a blizzard here in far northern Utah. That storm laid down over eight inches, and when a good blanket of snow covers the ground like that in this high mountain valley, it stays there until spring. Especially, if it just keeps on snowing – which it did. We didn't get our roses covered with compost and wood chips, we didn't get our carts and lawn tractors put away, and we didn't get the hen house and run tucked under the truck port. And more snow is forecast for tonight and tomorrow.

Well, what will be, will be. We did manage to get the hens under cover the day after the blizzard, and if the snow stays on the ground, and it will, the roses will be protected against the freeze-thaw of death. Someone is going to have to go out the wrap a couple of the short climbers with burlap however, to shield them from the wind. The ramblers will manage without much protection. They are species or near-species and have weathered worse winters than this.

And what's good about being more or less house bound in this weather, is that I can get caught up on this garden blog. I've had these photos of peonies up for months, waiting to get time to write the text. So, here goes.

Paeonia lactiflora 'Duchesse de Nemours'

The lactiflora peonies are the most widely cultivated peonies in gardens, the rootstock of which was brought from China in the early 1800s and late 1700s. It was then, and still is, known as the Chinese peony. From the Chinese stock hundreds of single, double, and bomb type peonies were developed in the West.

This and the peonies following are plants that die down during the winter (herbaceous) as distinguished from the tree peony which grows as tall as six feet, has woody stems which should not be pruned down unless injured, and is mainly of Japanese origin from Chinese and western developed stock. The tree peony (of which more in a later posting), is much preferred in Japanese gardens and homes.

Peonies are among the longest-lived plants, some collections in ancient estates thriving and blooming for a hundred years. They are not fussy about soil as long as it's neutral to slightly sweet and well drained. They seem to love our DragonGoose Farm alkaline soil. If you grow healthy lilacs, you can grow healthy peonies and, like lilacs, they do excellently in the norhern cold climates.

The roots of herbaceous peonies sould be planted with the topost "eyes" no more than two or three inches below ground level and, for bare root peonies, should be planted in the fall. If the roots looks a bit dried out, soak them for a few hours in tap water. For peonies sold by nurseries in pots, be sure the soil is well compacted; that is, that the peony had at least a season growing in the pot. Planting these potted peonies can be done in the spring as well as the fall.

They are happiest in a sunny site, but can also stand some shade. After blooming, they will leave behind mounds of glossy, often leathery leaves to act as background to other, later blooming flowers. They also do well as cut flowers -- a vase of peonies can last more than a week.

The French led the way in peony breeding, importing many roots of the genus from China. Among the French lovers of the peony was Comte de Cussy, an amateur gardener who was an eager importer of P. lactiflora, as variety with great potential for developing new and larger types of the plant with, best of all, fragrance.

His collection was inherited by Jacques Calot around 1850, who proceeded to turn out new varieties, many of which are popular today. One of those varieties is the exquisite herbaceous peony, 'Duchesse de Nemours', shown above. It's a fragrant double held nicely aloft with strong stems that seldom bend over from the weight of their luxuriant blossoms. The 'Duchesse' was offered to the public by Calot in 1856 and a century and a half later is still a favorite among gardeners.

Our 'Duchesse' is bright white with a touch of yellow at the base of the petals. In areas of less bright sunlight, the yellow touches are much more apparent, giving the blossoms a creamy color. This group of peonies shown is just short of the middle of a twenty-foot long peony bed.

Paeonia lactiflora ' Spiffy'

Paeonia lactiflora ' Spiffy' (Joan Shaw)

Peonies are classified by growth and blossom type. The Japanese type, favored by Japanese breeders of the Chinese peonies, have wide outer or guard petals with interesting bosses of stamens, carpels, and in the case of 'Spiffy', above, enlarged stamens called petaloids. This variety here has fuschsia-red guard petals and a pinkish cream center with a bit of fuschia mixed in. The blooms are very fragrant.

When I was a toddler, living with my parents on my Great Grandmother's farm in New Jersey, and again in a house by the Delaware River that had a postage-stamp garden in the back, the peonies growing in both places were very fragrant. After my marriage, many years later, when I was in position to have a large garden and began collecting peonies, I was disappointed to find that few of the dozen or so spectacular looking plants that I first bought were fragrant. Since then, I've been careful to scan descriptions for fragrance.

Paeonia lactiflora 'Cheddar Charm'

Paeonia lactiflora 'Cheddar Charm' (Joan Shaw)

For a while, when answering visitors to our garden who asked the name of this peony, I hesitantly answered, 'Cheddar Cheese', adding that it seemed to be an unfortunate name for a flower so beautiful. But when I started a search for its characteristics today -- this was many years after having planted the three roots that I bought from Klehm's Song Sparrow Farm -- I discovered that Klehm's 'Cheddar Cheese' was darker, almost cream, and had white petaloids decorating the yellow boss.

The white petaloids were something I'd never seen on these blossoms of mine. So I went back to my collection of Klehm's catalogs and found a surprising four cheddar types, all with white guard petals with the only difference being the decorative white petaloids in the yellow boss and a slight difference in the flatness and number of guard petals. I started calling my plant 'Cheddar Whatever' wondering which of the cheddars was mine. I finally settled on 'Cheddar Charm' as being the closest.

I knew it was cheddar-something because I'd found the remnants of the plant's tag early on, having been truncated by someone's hoe. But why so many cheddars, all bred by Roy Klehm? After puzzling over this cheddar interest, I took the trouble to find the location of the Klehm farm and all was illuminated. The farm is in Wisconsin and Wisconsin is the cheese capitol of the country

These blossoms are also fragrant, measure more than eight inches wide, and a real show stopper when I take people around to see what's blooming.

Paeonia lactiflora 'Sorbet'

Paeonia lactiflora 'Sorbet' (Melanie Shaw)

We have quite a number of Sorbet peonies in a long bed in the cutting garden which are both fragrant and lovely to look at. Melanie took this photo of a sorbet in full bloom from the side to show the many layers of petals. The bloom is a "bomb" type, very high and full of pink, lavender, white and, hidden among the profuse number of petals, a bit of canary yellow. Some peonies of this type in other parts of the country have quite a bit of canary yellow in the mid layer of petals.

I keep hoping to have some of these lovely flowers for my husband's parents' grave site on Memorial Day, but we are several miles north of their cemetery and our peonies are never blooming in the right time.

Paeonia lactiflora 'Festiva Maxima'

Paeonia lactiflora 'Festiva Maxima' (Larry Cannon)

The Sorbet, Cheddar Charm, and Spiffy peonies are recent introductions, but Festiva Maxima joins Duchesse de Nemours as one of the earliest introductions bred from Chinese rootstock. 'Festiva Maxima' was introduced by a breeder named Meillez in 1851 and, like the Duchesse and others pictured here, is fragrant. This blossom was taken on a cloudy day after a rain, but in the sun, the blossoms are pure white, extravagantly double, with flecks of crimson, the whole of it held up on strong stems.

Thisi plant grows about 30 inches high and one poster reported on a recent garden blog, reported a 'Festiva Maxima' that was planted in 1927 and is still going strong. Another gardener remarked upon its very strong fragrance, often drifting into the kitchen window. Another plus in its favor is the fact that both 'Festiva Maxima' and 'Duchesse de Nemours' have been popular for over 150 years and is thus relatively inexpensive compared to recently introduced types.

Paeonia lactiflora 'Bowl of Beauty'

Bowl of Beauty (Melanie Shaw)

This is another example of a fragrant Japanese type of peony, with wide near-single guard petals and a profusion of petaloids in the middle. Recently introduced (as opposed to those introduced a century and a half ago), the blossoms when fully opened measure ten inches wide, the boss is ivory and the guard petals a rich pink. I haven't mentioned this before, but deer are not fond of peonies. Thank goodness, because they've made this farm their second home for quite a few seasons until we surrounded the gardens with electric fences.

Mixed Paeonia at the north Edge of the Cuttting Garden

Peonies in in the north edge of the cutting garden

(Melanie Shaw)

Here is a loose grouping of peonies on the north edge of the cutting garden. From the left are Festiva Maxima, Karl Rosenfeld, Sarah Bernhardt (a fragrant soft pink), and what looks like more Karl Rosenfeld. Often the names of these peonies are lost in the mists of time and these peonies were moved from another bed, which is an interesting story in itself. I added these to what was originally a lily bed until the deer made short work of them -- the lilies that is. The lilies actually recovered, the tips of which are showing off to our right of the bench. The peony bed I rifled of plants recovered, too. They were 'Festiva Maxima', 'SarahBernhardt', and 'Karl Rosenfeld'.

These peonies were under a very old Siberian Elm, their roots tightly held in place by the big tree's huge roots and, of course quite deeply in shade. My effort in digging them up was far from the accepted way of moving peony plants -- tearing or ripping them up came closer to the technique I was forced to use. Amazingly enough, the transplanted peonies not only took root in their new bed, but thrived. But what was more surprising, was that I evidently left some peony roots behind. Not long afterwards I noticed the trio blooming again as if nothing had happened.

Since then, the big old tree was removed by our arborist, the trunk trimmed off to soil level, and a good sized hole or "pot" was ground down into the old trunk for the planting of a five-foot tall Alberta spruce, all accompanied by a good bit of tramping around by guys in boots. This was done in late winter. The next spring, the three left-behind peonies bloomed happily on. When peony breeders talk of the plant as one of the toughest in the panoply of garden flowers, that they withstand all kinds of temperatures, and that the plants, once in the soil, have been known to be still blooming after one hundred years -- well, they knew what they were talking about.

Happy Christmas, everyone,
Joan

Joan Katherine Shaw

December 2010

Photos - Melanie Shaw, Larry Cannon, and Joan Shaw as marked

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