2010 Summer Watering Peonies

Wow. We are only 1 week into the summer, and it is already bad. It is soo hot (100 degrees yesterday), and it hasn't rained in over two weeks, since June 13th. I felt so sorry for some of my peonies that I had to water a couple of them today. A few of them were drooping, and on some of them the leaves have turned yellow. This is not good. I hope we get some rain soon!

2010 APS Peony Convention Highlights

Here are few of my other favorite pictures from the 2010 American Peony Society Convention...

Rotary Gardens - Site of 2010 APS Convention

Award Ribbons	Coral Peonies

The Coolest Car at the Convention

2010 APS Peony Convention Hybridizers & Growers

One awesome part of the convention was getting to meet some of my favorite hybridizers and growers. It was neat to pick their brains on what has worked or not worked for them in areas I'm interested in. I also like learning about their operations to see how the business side of things work for them. Here are some pictures of some of the neat people I met at the show. I met lots of other neat people too, but I may not have a gotten a picture...
Reiner Jakubowski (APS Registrar) and me
Sarah Klehm & Roy Klehm (Klehm's Song Sparrow) and me
Don Hollingsworth (Hollingsworth Nursery) & me
Jim Adelman, me, and Carol Adelman (Adelman Peony Gardens)

2010 APS Court of Honor Peonies

There were several beautiful peonies on the Court of Honor this year, but I think my favorite was Peony 'Coral Sunset'. Only one peony made it to the Court of Honor from the amateur class, Peony 'Bartzella'. There were so few entries into the tree peony category that only two of them made it to the Court of Honor, Peony 'Waucedah Princess' and Peony 'Tria'. Actually there were very few tree peonies in the whole show. Some tree peony categories had no entries. So anyone interested in showing tree peonies should enter next year since there is very little competition.

Peony 'Lancaster Imp'	Peony 'Frances Mains'?	Peony 'Topeka Garnet'?
Peony ''?	Peony 'Coral Sunset'	Peony 'Rosedale'
Peony 'Bartzella'	Peony 'Love Affair'
Peony 'Waucedah Princess'	Peony 'Tria'

2010 APS Intersectional Peonies

There were several intersectional peonies entered into the 2010 APS flower show. Only two of those made it to the Court of Honor. One of them was Peony 'Bartzella' (a yellow) which was the only peony entered by someone in the amateur division that made it to the Court of Honor, and the other was 'Love Affair' (a white). The competition flowers were beautiful, but I think their class can be much improved in beauty and form with future hybridizing efforts.

2010 APS Peony Books

I purchased two books while I was at the 2010 American Peony Society Convention this year. Those books were 'Peonies 1997-2007' and 'The Best of 75 Years; 1904-1979' The green book 'Peonies 1997-2007' is normally $34.00 which they sold for $30.00, and the blue book 'The Best of 75 Years; 1904-1979' is normally $20.00 which they sold for $15.00 at the convention. So it was a good opportunity to get these books at a discounted price. The green book was highly recommended to me by Reiner Jakubowski, the registrar of the APS and also the author of the book. He said it was an excellent reference for anyone interested in hybridizing. Also it sounds like he put a lot of work into the publication correcting mistakes in past editions.

2010 APS Peony Seed Program

I was excited to get some seed from the APS Peony Seed Distribution Program this year. Since I've been a member for a few years now, this program has been available to me in the past, but I've never taken advantage of it. Somehow it was a bit more enticing to be able to select the seeds in person instead of ordering them through the mail. I got 9 packets of seeds, 8 of those packets were species peonies. The species seeds were $2.50 per pack and the cultivar seeds were $3.00 per pack. So I spent $23.00 in seeds. Not too bad. The seeds that I got were: P. brownii, P. caucasica, P. mascula, P. mlokosewitschii, P. ostii, P. peregrine, P. rockii, P. tenuifolia, P. veitchii. I am really excited to see how well these grow for me.

2010 APS Favorite Show Peonies

There were so many peony varieties on display. It is hard to come up with one favorite, but the peony that keeps popping into my mind is not the latest, greatest peony of rare color or form. It was registered in 1966 and hybridized by Bigger. It is Peony 'Pink Derby', and it was displayed by Adelman Peony Gardens. I don't yet have this variety, but I plan to order it for the fall. There were lots of other flowers with rare colors and forms that did catch my eye as well. Here are some pictures and variety names of some of those...

Peony 'Pink Derby'
Peony 'Falcon'	Peony 'The Fawn'	Peony 'Cream Delight'
Peony 'Lemon Chiffon'	Peony 'Coral Sunset'	Peony 'Etched Salmon'

2010 APS Banquet and Peony Auction

The American Peony Society 2010 banquet and auction were quite nice. The dinner was good, the people were sloshy (better bids that way), the officers were inducted, and the auction went on for quite some time. Although the highlight of the evening may have been seeing one of the incoming APS officers do the chicken dance for $20.00 at the request of some of our Dutch members! Too bad I didn't get a picture of that! Harvey Buchite, the outgoing president, gave a nice speech to induct the officers and the incoming president, Dana Tretheway. Also three additional board members were nominated from the floor. It looks like the board representation will be a little more geographically diverse next year. I'd like to see more representation from the southern region as well.

2010 APS Peony Seminars

I was able to attend 4 of the 5 seminars at the American Peony Society convention this year. I wanted to attend all of them, but I lost track of time and missed one of them while photographing the beautiful flowers on display. The seminars I attended were “Entering your Cut Flower Peonies in an Exhibition” by Dana Tretheway, “Companion Plants for Peonies” by Mark Dwyer, “The Best Fragrant Peonies” by Harvey Buchite, and “Down Peony Lane” by Roy Klehm. I missed the seminar by Kim Hummer on Peony Genetics. I wish I had attended that one and skipped the companion plant seminar instead. Excluding the companion plant seminar, I felt like I learned something about peonies and the society from each of the seminars.
Dana Tretheway's “Entering your Cut Flower Peonies in an Exhibition”

2010 APS Grand Champion Peony - Flying Pink Saucer

Flying Pink Saucer

Flying Pink Saucer is the Grand Champion of the 2010 American Peony Society National Convention. This flower was hybridized by William Krekler and Roy Khlem. I guess it is fitting since the peony convention is here in Wisconsin, and Roy gave everyone at the convention a personal tour of his farm. I'm sure he's thrilled. Roy gave the talk on my tour bus, and he was quite entertaining. The flower seems to be listed for sale on his web site currently, name misspelled. I am guessing this one may sell out this year. It is listed as a double on his web site, although the bloom displayed at the convention was semi-double, and the APS registry description lists it as semi-double as well. It is a beautiful flower, though. Check it out...

2010 APS Peony Convention Farm Tour

The weather did not cooperate this morning for the tour of Klehm's Song Sparrow farm. It rained quite a bit. However, it did start to clear up this afternoon. I was able to get several shots of varieties that interested me. I saw a few peonies in person that I had been interested in, in the past, and after seeing them in person, intensified my interest. The Award of Landscape Merit meeting is tonight, and the flower show opens to the public tomorrow after judging. I met several people that I have ordered peonies from, talked to over email, or heard of in the APS bulletin. It is nice to put faces with names.

Klehm's Song Sparrow Farm

2010 APS Peony Convention Park Picnic

Today I arrived in Wisconsin. The weather is nice, and so are the people. The recently formed Wisconsin Peony Society hosted the welcome picnic. I made some new friends today at the picnic and hope to make many more tomorrow during the farm tour. I haven't seen a peony yet, but I am so ready! It would be nice to see more intersectional peonies in bloom, but I think their season has probably passed here. Also I don't think Klehm grows very many of them, as I haven't seen too many listed in their catalog for sale. They did hand out an abbreviated version of their catalog in the registration packet, and I did see 3 yellow intersectionals for sale on the back cover. I don't recall seeing any more, but I haven't had time to review the catalog in detail. It will be so nice to see the peonies in person tomorrow!

2010 APS Peony Convention Preparation

I now have a place to stay for the convention, and less than 48 hours before my flight leaves for Milwaukee. My focus now is on what I need to bring to the convention and what I can learn from it. My camera is the most important thing I can think of to bring. I am hoping to learn a little bit about displaying flowers for showing. I don't think I'll be showing peonies any time soon, but I did enter the NC State Fair flower show last year for the first time and won three 3rd place ribbons. I think I will do much better this year as I already have plans to adjust my strategy, but I hope I will learn even more about showing flowers from this year's peony convention as well. Since the NC State Fair is always in the fall I won't ever be entering any peonies into their contest (alas), but I think some flower showing tips in general will help me.