Paeonia 2013

[Gail]

Paeonia 'Joseph Rock'. Wow,what a stunner!

Absolutely beautiful flower John but I think not 'Joseph Rock' - that is a particular cultivar name given to a plant that doesn't have the pink in the petals that your's shows. Full story of Rock and the peonies here; http://www.paeon.de/h2006/rocks_peony.html

Seed raised plants vary greatly. I've got one from HPS seed labelled P. rockii which is the classic pure white with maroon flares but one from AGS seed flowered for the first time this year (11 years after sowing!) and it is a big pink double just a hint of the flares if you part the petals to look - redeemed by a lovely light tea rose scent.

[Gail]

Peony Society AGM/informal show yesterday at Wisley yesterday was a good day with some lovely peonies on display, mostly from Claire Austin and Jo Bennison. Some nice peonies in the gardens too, particularly P. officinalis in the herb garden and P. peregrina in the rock garden.
Lovely to meet Matteo too - SRGC forum members do get about!

[Gail]

Athena
Fen Gong Wei Ji
Firelight
and P. peregrina on the rock garden

[astragalus]

The P. peregrina is absolutely sensational.  That is not a red that you can ignore.

[Catwheazle]

So now a lot of heavy rain has finally stopped in Bavaria and the temperatures have
also risen about 6 ° C again :-)
.... and finally blooming - for the first time - Paeonia sterniana, or P. emodii ssp. sterniana

* happy *

[greenspan]

wow...sterniana. congratulation for this rare Paeonia and in such good condition. i'm searching for a long time for this Paeonia. is it grown from seed or imported from china? sometimes the wellknown chinese sources offer this plant, but i always got white obovata. does anybody else grow sterniana and can tell me a source (seed/plant)?

[Leena]

Thank you Gail for the photos from the show, what a nice picotee peony 
And P.peregrina. For some reason my garden is not so suitable for P.peregrina, I had a cultivar 'Sunshine' which suffered from root rot (or something like that), now I have one good seedling of P.peregrina, with one flower bud, I hope it survives until autumn when I can move it to my driest bed, but so far it is good.

P.sterniana is really nice! I'm also looking for the seeds, if anyone knows a source where to purchase them.

[Catwheazle]

Thanks, but I just got lucky. 
I had found in the "collection box" a great gardening
(at Illertissen/Germany) Paeonia a emodii. Only roots, no bud.

This is now came out here. Would also have what may be quite different.

I will by all means try to get seeds. However, the spread is already fixed!

regards
Bernd

[Leena]

P.humilis 'Flore Pleno' is a very common peony in Finland, and I believe also in Sweden, but not so much in Europe. It grows in many old gardens and even in abandoned gardens among the grass, and I believe it is tracked down to at least the beginning of 1900 (if not earlier). It is called "juhannuspioni" (midsummer peony) here, even though it flowers  in early June in south of Finland, about the same time as P. x festiva 'Rubra Plena'. I got my plant from my mother-in-law who had gotten hers from an old house where she remembers a big bush of it growing in 1930s. It is a very tough peony, but on the other hand very prone to root molds and best grown in rock garden with good drainage and no fertilizing, peculiar that it still can survive in almost wild state, but that is propably because it forms adventitious buds in the roots, and even if you dig it up, and even a tiny piece of root stays behind, it will start to grow from there.
It is about 50cm high, the leaves are glaucous blueish green, and hairy. It has usually two hairy carpels, and sometimes stamens, but not always. The flower is not very big, about 10cm.
The first two pictures were taken in sunlight, the third early morning today when the plant was still in shade. I moved my plant couple of years ago, so it still doesn't flower very much, but anyway I wanted to show this peony.
Is this peony known in Estonia, Latvia, Russia or other places?

[greenspan]

@Catwheazle

here a description of H.R. Flechter, 1959 of sterniana (source):

A perennial herb with glabrous stems 30-90 cm. high. Leaves alternate, biternate, including the petiole up to 30 cm. long; leaflets glabrous deeply cut into many narrow elliptic or narrow oblong-elliptic acuminate or acute segments up to 10 cm. long and 2 cm. broad, dark green above, glaucous below. Flowers solitary up to 8 cm. across. Sepals 4, the exterior lanceolate, foliaceous, longer than the petals, the interior ovate, apiculate up to 1.5 cm. long and broad. Petals white, obovate up to 3.5 cm. long, 2 cm. broad, thin and papery. Stamens with white filaments and yellow anthers. Carpels 3-4, glabrous, pale green. Follicles scarlet when mature, 2.5 cm. long, 1 cm. broad, seed indigo-blue.

P. mairei and P. emodi sit comfortably in Section Paeon, subsection Foliolatae F. C. Stern. In this subsection the species are all herbaceous and the lower leaves are cut into distinct leaflets all of which are entire; P. mascula Miller is typical of the subsection. P. sterniana, on the other hand, has its leaflets very deeply lobed or toothed and is quite clearly a member of Section Paeon, subsection Dissectifoliae F. C. Stern. In this subsection its nearest of kin is P. anomala L., widely distributed from the Ural Mountains to Lake Baikal in Central Asia. The fades of the two species is very similar, though P. sterniana lacks the lines of very short hairs along the veins on the upper leaf surface, which are so characteristic of P. anomala. P. veitchii Lynch, which wilson introduced from Szechwan for veitch in 1907, also is closely allied but is at once distinguished by having two or more flowers to a stem, whereas the flowers of P. sterniana always are solitary.

your plant is first flowering, a young plant, potted, and in my opinion the number of flowers per stem is not a significant character at this time, because when mature and planted in open soil maybe another flowering behaviour might be seen (more flowers per stem). why i get dubious about your sterniana is the number of carpels, only 2 (i can't see more in the second foto). maybe also a feature of being a young plant.

so i made some inquiries today. i had a talk with a staff of gaissmayer nursery/illertissen about their "emodi". he told me, that they got the plants from a dutch nursery as "emodi". meanwhile we know, that nurseries often sell emodi, but they mostly sell the hybrid 'Windflower' (both types "Early" + "Late"). i have one 'Windflower' in my garden, don't know whether the 'Early' or 'Late' type. friends told me, that the 'Late' differs' from 'Early' in height. but i don't remember which one is taller/lower). your sterniana looks different to my 'Windflower' type, but my stock is planted in garden for 6 years now and a big plant, yours is potted + a young plant. difficult to compare.

here a lot of fotos of the true sterniana, photographed by dr. burkhardt on a china expedition 2006, area of Bomi in south-east tibet, the only known habitat of sterniana: sterniana fotos.
compare these with your plant please.

i fear, that the dutch nursery sold a 'Windflower' type to gaissmeyer nursery. you will find out, when you pollinate your plant and get no seed because the 'Windflower' is steril. the gaissmayer staff will send me some photos of their "emodi" plants, which still remain in the nursery, but are not for trade (maybe i get some). i asked him to make fotos of the habitus with details of number of carpels (if they flowered this year). so let's wait what i find out when i got his email.

[Catwheazle]

Super Thank you, although I'm a little disappointed. I'll get to all cases veruchen seeds.
.. hopefully it goes with my pseudo? "sterniana" not like the mlokosewitschii.
Although it sets seed every year, but unfortunately the always empty.
I am now trying to get hold ne second. Is this normal, or do I fear that because what's been crossed?
My plant is in soil, not in pot ! 5 shoots, 2 flowers single each on her own shoot.
Greetings
Bernd

PS: ... from the photos I can see no real difference to sternia. We'll see ....

[Catwheazle]

Hi again,
can you post a picture of your "windflower"? Whar are their parents ?

Thanks
Bernd

[Irm]

today in Berlin in flower is a hybrid "white innocence"

[Irm]

and near 

[Catwheazle]

@greenspan
hi,
"windflower" is possible :-( ... but hope dies last. early windflower, a selection-of emodii should already blooming in May and have a broad grew. That does not fit with me. "late windflower" is said to have nodding flowers .'s a hybrid of emodii x beresowskii ..... does not fit :-)
I've dusted ... the tension remains, although I fear that it is tantamount to a "late windflower".