2018 Peony Blooms - Week 1 Very Early

Well, I think the peony bloom season has gotten off to a pretty good start this year, despite the extended period of cold weather we've been having this year. The bloom season did not start at the end of March (which it sometimes does). April has been shaping up to be pretty cool too so far. If you don't have any very early peony blooms in your garden, I'd definitely recommend looking up one of these varieties to purchase. It just make you feel so happy seeing these first early peony blooms begin to open! I think my favorite of this week's blooms has definitely been the Paeonia Rockii tree peony that I grew from seed. I just love the color, and the nice dark purple flares radiating from the center. The red fernleaf hybrid peony and Peony 'Roy Pehrson's Best Yellow' are both pretty reliable very early bloomers for me here. Tree Peony 'Yao's Yellow' bloomed for me for the first time this year, and it smells heavenly! Which bloom is your favorite???

Tree Peony P. Rockii Seedling


Peony 'Yao's Yellow'


Red Fernleaf Hybrid Peony


Peony 'Roy Pehrson's Best Yellow'

2018 Intersectional Peony 'Scrumdidleyumptious' Arrives

Intersectional Peony 'Scrumdidleyumptious' Potted Up
My intersectional peonies from 2018 Tulip World Offers Intersectional Peony 'Scrumdidleyumptious' for $12.95! arrived this past Friday, and I immediately potted them up. The foliage had already been growing in the bag for some time. Whenever I've gotten roots like this and planted them out in their spot in the garden in the past, the foliage seems to burn up in the sun and die. I think they've been in the bag in the dark too long, and started growing in almost no light or completely no light. That's why the foliage growth is so pale. Then when I plant them out in their full sun location, the intensity of the sun's rays are just too much for the immature foliage that has been growing in the dark. So this time I decided to try potting them up and putting them in the shade for a little while, until I'm satisfied that the foliage is growing well and will live. It's kind of like hardening off plants that you've been growing indoors or in a greenhouse that are used to a warmer more even air temperatures. You have to kind of ease them into living outside again.
Intersectional Peony 'Scrumdidleyumptious' in Bags
I'm hoping by easing these plants into the light, they will have a better chance of survival. I'm just lucky I had a couple of pots and some top soil. Usually I recycle all of my pots right away, and I don't usually have top soil. I had been keeping a few pots on hand in case I wanted to share some plants, and I was using the top soil to try to fix some bare spots in my lawn and improve the soil around some underperforming plants. I kept these intersectional peonies in the shade all day on Friday, and on Saturday we had an entire day of rain. So a nice, cloudy sky to help these immature intersectional peonies to get on their way - growing! I'm just curious to see if they actually have intersectional peony foliage. We'll see... ;-)
Intersectional Peony 'Scrumdidleyumptious' Roots

2018 Peony Companions Daffodils

Peony 'Soft Lemon Kisses' with Daffodil 'Sunlight Sensation'
I'm sure many of you have daffodils as a companion with your peonies. If you don't then you should definitely consider planting some daffodil bulbs this fall. Daffodils can be an entertaining distraction while you are waiting for those peony blooms to open. They are also super easy to grow. Just dig a hole, mix in some fertilizer, put the bulbs in the bottom of the hole (spaced out), and then replace the dirt. These beautiful and easy bulbs are very reliable and will come back year after year.
Peony 'Color Magnet' with Daffodil 'Cheerfulness'
If you get lucky enough, you may even have some daffodils and very early peonies or tree peonies to bloom at the same time. There are some summer blooming varieties of daffodil like 'Summer Cheer' that will bloom later than other daffodils as well. Daffodils nowadays are not just the yellow flower that your great-grandma grew. There are so many forms, shapes, sizes, and colors to choose from now - from lemon yellows, to white, to yellow with orange, to white with pink and double daffodils, butterfly daffodils, miniature daffodils, to daffodils with multiple blooms per stem. Have fun picking out some early spring colorful cheerfulness!
Peony 'Pehrson's Violet Frisbee' with Double Daffodil 'Tahiti'

2018 Spring Tree Peony Planting 'Kinkaku' & 'Lavender Grace'

Tree Peony 'Lavender Grace' from Song Sparrow
The Tree Peony 'Lavender Grace' that I purchased when 2018 Klehms Song Sparrow Offers Tree Peony 'Lavender Grace' on Front Page of Web Site, arrived this week and so did another peony I ordered from Ebay seller orientalpeony, Tree Peony 'Kinkaku', also known as 'Souvenir de Maxime Cornu'. I got both of them planted this week. They are quite a bit behind my other tree peonies in foliage growth, but we are set to have a nice day of rain tomorrow (after almost 2 weeks on no rain!). So that should give them both a nice cloudy day to settle in after been sun-starved for a few days while in transit. We are also expecting some lower than normal temperatures and since both of these tree peonies came from a colder growing zone, that should help them feel more at home and hopefully begin to adjust to the much warmer temperatures here.
Tree Peony 'Lavender Grace' with Bud
Both of these tree peonies were actually a very nice size, and Tree Peony 'Lavender Grace' even came with a bud on it. Let's hope I can take care of it well enough to see it through to maturity. Tree Peony 'Kinkaku' looks like it will have more foliage than 'Lavender Grace', and it appears to be a bit older too. I can't tell if it has a flower bud on it or not. I guess there could be, but right now it looks like it will not flower this year. All in all I am pretty happy with both of my purchases, and I can't wait to see them grow...
Tree Peony 'Kinkaku' Sprouting

Tree Peony 'Kinkaku' from Ebay

2018 Third Peony Bloom of the Season - P. Rockii Lavender Tree Peony Seedling

P. Rockii Lavender Seedling
The 3rd peony bloom of the season opened today, well, almost. It didn't quite open all the way. So I guess a bit of the excitement will be saved for tomorrow, but I got to see the full bud on this peony today, and the beautiful lavender color of its petals. The awesome lavender color on this one excites me, as well as the fact that it seems to be so vigorous, blooming much sooner than its siblings, and growing much taller and faster as well. This P. rockii seedling is actually from some seed I bought on Ebay, 2013 Tree Peony P. Rockii Seeds on Ebay, which turned out to be 2013 P. Rockii Peony Seeds from Cricket Hill Garden. It is the first P. rockii tree peony to bloom for me ever. It first bloomed last year, but I mostly missed it, just saw a few petals dropping after the bloom. I have been growing P. rockii's that I bought as plants (from 3 separate sources) longer than this seedling has existed, and they've still never bloomed. This P. Rockii lavender seedling actually has 2 buds on it this year. So I will get the chance to see two blooms on it!
P. Rockii Lavender Seedling with 2 Buds