Monday, June 28, 2010

The main show of Garden Peonies

A week and a bit ago the Paeonia lactifloras (the Chinese Peony, or what I call the Garden Peony) started popping into bloom in all their variety of forms and every shade of colour from white to red. How many shades of pink are there anyways?!! Here some views of the groups of potted lactifloras (and some hybrids mainly involving lactiflora parentage) which I've been growing from seed, for sale. Most are blooming this year for the first time, and I have so far photographed and labelled (with a personal number) just over 100 of them, with perhaps 15 or 20 with buds yet to open.

Of course, this being a main peak of the peony season we have been found by heavy rains. First the mini-deluge out of nothing yesterday evening, and today with an extended rainfall of varying weight but large accumulation. So these photos of yesterday's fine upstanding plants have would today feature bedraggled or mushed flowers with some recumbent stems (some of the plants have double or semi-double flower forms, which are notorious for lax stems)











1 comment:

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This is a great showcase you have here. I just started a blog and posted about Peonies and ants. I'd love to know what your experience with them has been. Please feel free to read my experience with them on my blog: http://www.learnorburn.com and I'd love to hear your input. I'm on the hunt now to see if insects other than ants are attracted to Peonies because of the sweet wax on the blooms. I know some wasps like it too. The relationship between the two, as I posted on my blog, is what's most interesting to me. Cheers!