Tree Peony Blooms 2015

This year is definitely the best year so far for blooms, and they should get better from here on out. Here's a sample of what I have.

Some of them are grown from seed however those all tend to be pretty boring single blooms, nowhere near as impressive as the known cultivars. The do appear to however carry more vigor than the other ones. I will likely dig those out and replace them with more impressive plants. 

December peony buds, and buds for other plants 2012

With November and early December, temperatures will often fall withing the ideal vernalization zone of 40F to 45F which causes many plants to develop their buds in preparation for spring. For my climate, vernalization usually occurs once in the late fall, and then again by early spring as the plants produce the growth hormones needed for flowering, and overall vigor for the following year.

Here are some pictures of the tree & itoh peonies. The buds for the herbaceous peonies still haven't popped out of the soil yet so I didn't take pictures of those. They don't look like much now, but some of these may have enough energy stored from this year to produce flowers next year. They usually start swelling more by the beginning of March when daylight gets noticeably longer and temperatures start to rise.

Here are just a few of my tree/ itoh peony buds. It would be a very long post if I posted pictures of every one of them.

Solification of tree/ itoh peony stems

Towards the end of July, tree peonies usually start to develop brown stems as they start becoming woody and showing their true nature. Here are a few closeups just to show how it looks.  Once tree peonies darken up, they are usually set to survive as long as they are planted deeply enough to develop their own roots.

This one appears to be solid already. Like trees, their stems and branches tend to harden off completely before they ever expand in diameter.

Sedum