Ruislip & Eastcote & Northwood Gazette
PETAL POWER
Big, blowsy and often scented, peonies look wonderful in a summer border
Peonies are the epitome of blousy English gardening. Their luxury floral rosettes not only enhance any selfrespecting British border, but also inspire artists and fashion designers who adore their sumptuous range of colour and layers of texture. Both their foliage and flowers exude beauty.
I’ve planted a few in my garden recently, taking care to ensure the soil has been enhanced through the addition of dollops of well-rotted manure.
I added a spadeful or two into the planting hole, which will feed these hungry specimens and ensure that moisture is retained around the roots.
If you plant them into rich fertile soil they will need minimal, if any, feeding thereafter.
On poorer soils you will need to feed with a slow-release fertiliser every spring. For optimum flowering, plant in full sunshine.
The most important thing to remember when planting herbaceous peonies is that they don’t like going in too deep – the tubers should be no more than an inch below soil.
Bear this in mind also when you are mulching your borders – don’t bury the crowns in a thick mulch, just mulch around but not on top of the crown. Burying them is the most common reason for a lack of flowers.
They like moist but well-drained soil so if your soil is a very heavy clay it would benefit from having additional humus material added, such as garden compost or some grit, to improve the drainage.
The most commonly planted peonies are the herbaceous varieties, with beautiful bowl-shaped silky flowers, which die down over winter and then you see their fat red buds poking through the soil in spring.
Best known examples here are Duchesse de Nemours with its delicious lemony white fragrant flowers, and Sarah Bernhardt, another old-fashioned favourite, which has beautiful rose pink, fragrant double flowers.
However, there is another type called tree peonies – these are
Be sure not to plant them too deep or they will not flower
deciduous shrubs which form a permanent woody stem and usually have large, often spectacular, flowers.
These like some shelter from winter and spring frost as their early blooms can be damaged.
Check when you’re buying them if they are grafted on to herbaceous rootstock. If this is the case, you will plant them quite deeply so you won’t get suckers from the root stock.
But did you know that there is a third type of peony? It is called Itoh and it’s a cross breed between herbaceous and tree peonies, combining the best characteristics of both.
These amazing hybrids don’t need staking as they have a woody stem to support them, but they don’t grow to
tree peony size – they remain relatively compact like herbaceous peonies.
They have the show-stopping flowers of tree peonies and flower for longer, sometimes blooming twice.
Like tree peonies they have a wide range of colours, including yellow, pink and apricot. Their foliage is handsome as well, turning red in autumn.
The Itoh varieties are more expensive to buy, but when you take into account their strong points they are well worth the extra investment.
Choice cultivars to look out for are Cora Louise, with flowers that are white with a dramatic magenta flare at the base of the petal. Bartzella produces beautiful golden yellow, lemon-scented blooms.
Finally Hilary, which offers your garden a dash of pink loveliness.