Paeonia 2010

[TheOnionMan]

You'll show us 'Buckeye Belle' when she's fully out Mark.

Well, I can show you now (with previous year photos).  I hope you like enormous red flowers

[Gail]

Buckeye Belle is probably my favourite hybrid - sumptuous flowers and a really good vigorous plant.
Here is mine at the moment (leaves behind are Colchicum speciosum 'Album') and an old picture of flowers.

[Ragged Robin]

Great to see the buds of Paeonia emerging and unfurling with promise of glorious flowers to come - Buckey Belle is a wonderful blood red and generous cup in your photo, Mark.

[Ragged Robin]

Hendrik, your P. clusii is so incredibly beautiful - congratulations on its first flowering 

[Lesley Cox]

Thank you Mark. I certainly DO like enormous red flowers and if I wore a hat, I'd happily wear one of these in it. I've not seen this hybrid in NZ but will certainly look for her now. She's gorgeous!

[TheOnionMan]

Thank you Mark. I certainly DO like enormous red flowers and if I wore a hat, I'd happily wear one of these in it. I've not seen this hybrid in NZ but will certainly look for her now. She's gorgeous!

Glad you like it Leslie.  It's silly when I think about having this plant, it was not through any sort of deliberate selection that I grow that Paeonia cultivar... the year following my deck-rebuild project, in the autumn I was looking for shrubs and nursery stock to plant around the deck, my wife wanting some "BIG SHOWY FLOWERS" .  So, looking over the dregs of unbought plants in the fall, about a dozen varieties of Paeonies were available, and not knowing anything about the names, I merely selected 6 plants that had good autumn leaf color.  I got lucky that Buckeye Belle was among them... wish all six were that variety, the others are typical pink & white lactiflora hybrids. 

In a fiollowing year the plants started collapsing with mold or disease after a long stint of rain and hot summer weather; I treated them with a chemical (sorry, I forget what is was, a nursery friend gave me some) that saved most, lost 1 of the 2 Buckeye Belle plants.  I replaced the one that died with P. wittmanniana.

Uploaded a photo of my deck in 2007, the tree in the center is Magnolia zenii, while growing lustily for a couple years, died the following winter, the tree suffering from softened buds and wood when we had ridiculous ultra-mild weather all through December and into January, then go hit with real winter weather.  The Paeonia plants are growing at the base and to the right of that tree.

[Hans A.]

Yesterday a friend and me made a mountaintour  with the idea to find Paeonia cambessedesii, a species which never has been very common but has become still rarer in the last years.
Last months a (very kind) forumist and me searched allready for it but we could not localize new plants, but I we were very glad to find the few old ones.
Climbing through the mountains we finally found a few more - fortunately some still were in flower!

[Gail]

Wonderful to see them in the wild Hans, thank you so much for posting.

[Ragged Robin]

Marvellous that your efforts were rewarded finding these beautiful Paeonia cambessedesii still flowering in the wild Hans - and what a habitat....did you have ropes? 

[johnw]

Nothing beats the new shoots of peonies at this time of year.

The last two shots are of one received from Don Armstrong which I believe was id'ed last year.

johnw

[Ragged Robin]

Exciting shots of your peonies emerging John and the last lot of buds almost have a farina look  

(Was this post supposed to be in another thread?)

[Maggi Young]

Exciting shots of your peonies emerging John and the last lot of buds almost have a farina look  

(Was this post supposed to be in another thread?)

I rather think it was, Robin.... I've shuffled it along to Paeonia!

[Luc Gilgemyn]

They look gorgeous Hans !!!  A very fruitful trip !

John, they look like red mushrooms emerging like that ! 

[fermi de Sousa]

Yesterday a friend and me made a mountaintour  with the idea to find Paeonia cambessedesii, a species which never has been very common but has become still rarer in the last years.
Climbing through the mountains we finally found a few more - fortunately some still were in flower!

Well your pics certainly re-inforce my idea that the Rock Garden is the perfect place for this species!
Thanks for your efforts, Hans.
Interestingly enough we've just harvested the first seeds set on this species in our garden!
cheers
fermi

[arillady]

Hans you both had a very fruitful search for Paeonia cambessedesii. Lovely species that I must try.