Peonies

This is peony week in Wisconsin if there was ever such a thing. Peony Sunday is tomorrow in Rosendale at the Sisson's Peony Garden and the American Peony Society is meeting in Green Bay this week holding their peony convention.

And I am enthralled by peonies.

Roy Phearson's Yellow

Peony 'Red Charm'

  

Peony 'Tinka'

Peony 'Lavender Whisper'

Peony 'Mackinac Grand'

 

The above were all taken at Rosendales' Sisson Peony Garden. They have those they know named, but many are not. This is not so different from my own garden. Peonies, with their long life spans of even 100 years, are the ultimate pass-along plant.

It seemed at one time in my youth, peonies were everywhere. They bloomed in long stripes in the middle of lawns only to be mowed over by the first of July. This is a terribly wrong way to treat peonies, which might explain their disappearance from many farm yards over the years.

I have dug parts of peonies from every place I have lived. I have about eight different ones, alas I only suspect or know the names for half of them.

I only wish I had more room for peonies.

This one in my own garden may actually be 'Tinka'. When fully in bloom it seems identical. As 'Tinka' was hybridizes here in WI by Wilbur Sisson, and I believe this one is a piece of one from my grandmother's it would seem possible.

Simply Peonies

 

Sun is shining, gardening.  Do stop to admire the peonies!  Their time is fleeting!

A Few of My Favorites From the Past Year

A lazy Sunday viewing of some of my favorite plants from throughout the past year.

Enjoy!


My front sidewalk in late July and early August is a walk worth taking for three to four weeks each summer.


Lily 'Satisfaction certainly gives that.

Creamy yellow white lily has lots of blooms and reblooms, giving the longest and most floriferous show in my garden.


A lot more of these Asiatic lilies are becoming established in my garden. They are worth the space.


'Golden Spirit' smokebush is a lime green in the spring. During the fall show, the leaves turn a golden apricot and seem to glow from within. It is a wonderful addition to my shrub border that also includes a sweet cherry, a pear, and an apple.


Another shrub from my shrub border, viburnum tomentosa.

When my dappled willow 'Hakuro Nishiki' (dappled brocade in Japanese)sends up its new growth, it is a beauty stunner in the landscape.







Two barberries planted for contrast.


Smokebush 'Nordine' showing beautiful coloration of spring foliage prior to blooming.


Green girl cast iron wall hanging rusting into a patina.


Peonies are one of my favorite flowers. I wish I had room for a full peony border.



White Asiatic lily with black stems planted en masse at Olbrich Gardens.

Voluptuous and Overblown

Lilac prestonia 'Donald Wyman' and old-fashioned pink and white peonies

Peonies!

There was a time when ever farmstead around these parts had a long row of white, red, and pink peonies. They are incredible in their blooming power for a scant two weeks sometime just after the end of May. Until William Radler perfected his Knockout roses, these beauties reigned supreme in the hearts of the Wisconsin's June flower lovers, with iris as an afterthought or compensation for the requisite June deluge which denuded these beauties of their petals.

These long beds of these voluptuous beauties are gone, making way for wider driveways capable of handling the 8-hopper corn planter or 16-row disc. They have succumbed in close shorn mowing habits in country cemeteries, where their planting was commonplace because of their often cited 50-75 year life span.

Here in my tiny village, along side my pink house, I have planted a length of these blooms, their neighbors, lily of the valley, 'Annabelle' hydrangeas, and bridalwreath spirea, and I, whom still appreciate their beauty. They take a while to establish, but they have time and I have been waiting, somewhat patiently.

Perhaps it will not be much longer for them to make their entrance on the floriferous stage.