Plant of the month - peonies
Beautiful, blousy herbaceous peonies are one of the floral highlights of late spring/early summer. Bursting from fat, round buds, these blooms are luxurious and lush, whether you enjoy them in your borders or cut them for a vase.
Peonies can have a reputation for being sulky when they’re not growing in the right conditions, but if you get them right, you’ll be rewarded with a long-lived, low maintenance hardy herbaceous perennial which flowers reliably year after year.
Although their flowering period is relatively short – lasting only a few weeks around May to mid-June – peonies provide plenty of bang for your buck. They come in a wide range of shades, from pure white to soft cream, yellow and apricot through various shades of pink to vivid crimson. There are single, double or semi-double varieties, offering wide, open blooms or thickly ruffled petals.
When in full bloom, some of these flowers can be rather top heavy, especially during spells of rain, so it’s well worth putting in place a sturdy support for the stems early in the season as they emerge from the ground and before you find them swinging around wildly during stormy weather.
Peonies enjoy full sun to partial shade and rich, well-drained soil. The key to successful peony growing is to make sure the crown of the plant is not buried lower than 5cm deep under the soil’s surface. If it’s planted too deep your plant will produce lots of foliage but it won’t flower. The other recommendation is to buy a well-established plant, as peonies don’t flower reliably until they’re about five years old. If you buy a young plant you may find you have to be patient for a few years before you can enjoy those beautiful blooms.
Once established, your peony won’t need much maintenance; the leaves should turn an attractive colour in the autumn before becoming a bit tatty – they can be trimmed back in winter or early spring, along with the old flowering shoots. You can feed and mulch around the plant but be careful not to bury the crown.
Peonies work well in the middle of a mixed border with other herbaceous perennials for a fantastic early summer show.
