May 23, 2025 • 52 mins
Peonies are a springtime showstopper, fragrant, full, and beloved in gardens across the world. Check out this week’s Good Growing Podcast and explore the history of peonies, their flower forms, and tips for growing, dividing, and relocating them. We also discuss why ants are drawn to their buds, what might be keeping your peonies from blooming, and how to make the most of their short but spectacular bloom season.
Watch us on YouTube: https://youtu.be/_CB0qzCxJ5Q
Skip to what you want to know:
00:33 - Welcome, Ken. How do you pronounce peony? Peonies and the rain.
02:12 - History and types of peonies
07:27 - Peonies as cut flowers
13:48 - Bloom times and cultivars
17:02 - Flower forms
22:20 - Why do we see ants on peony flowers?
25:38 - Peony diseases
30:33 - Moving and dividing peonies
35:52 - Breeding your own peonies
40:57 - The story of Peonydale
47:23 - Why aren't my peonies blooming?
50:17- Wrap-up, thank yous, what’s up next week, and goodbye!
Read more about it:
Peony flower forms: https://americanpeonysociety.org/learn/herbaceous-peonies/flower-types-anatomy/
Peonydale and the Wettengel Family Story: http://wimuseum.org/peonydale-and-the-wettengel-family-story/
Contact us!
Chris Enroth: cenroth@illinois.edu
Ken Johnson: kjohnso@illinois.edu
Check out the Good Growing Blog: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowing
Subscribe to the weekly Good Growing email: https://go.illinois.edu/goodgrowingsubscribe
Any products or companies mentioned during the podcast are in no way a promotion or endorsement of these products or companies.
Barnyard Bash: freesfx.co.uk
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Chris Enroth (00:05):
Welcome to the Good Growing podcast. I am Chris
Enroth, horticulture educatorwith University of Illinois
Extension coming at you fromMacomb, Illinois, and we have
got a great show for you today.Peonies? Peonies? We're gonna be
talking about this favoritespring blooming plant, which has
(00:25):
its own variation of names liketomato tomahto, potato potato.
But you know, I'm not doing thisby myself. I am joined as always
every single week byhorticulture educator Ken
Johnson in Jacksonville. Hey,Ken.
Ken Johnson (00:36):
Hello, Chris. I think it's peony.
Chris Enroth (00:39):
Peony. Why I
Ken Johnson: That's the way I've always said (00:40):
undefined
it anyway.
Chris Enroth (00:42):
That's how I've I've done it as well. The peony.
The peony. Your folks are gonnahear all different ways to
pronounce this plant today. So,yeah, feel free to put your own
phonetical twist on this plantin the comments below.
Oh, well, Ken, I I do have tosay sort of related to peonies
(01:07):
that it has been very dry, andnow it is very wet. It has
rained a lot, and all of thepeonies are just completely
flopped over in my yard. Like,what the heck just happened? We
got a downpour last night. Howabout you?
Did you get some good rain?
Ken Johnson (01:27):
Yeah. Plus so we got about an inch, and I haven't
checked I didn't check thepeonies in our yard, but driving
the kids to school, there's alot of I won't say flattened,
but a lot of peonies where theflowers are much closer to the
ground than they were the daybefore.
Chris Enroth (01:44):
And, usually, they rebound somewhat. But sometimes,
you know, the those flowers,they're pretty big. They kind of
just almost as naturally willdroop towards the ground. So I
guess we'll talk about all thattoday.
Ken Johnson (02:00):
Yes. I think especially the I will get into
flower forms like the doubles. Ithink those hold a lot of water
too, and that just down they go.
Chris Enroth (02:09):
Yes. Yes. Well, there's a lot of history when it
comes to the peony, and I thinkit it's gonna be mentioned
throughout today's show, youknow, these different different
ways that this plant hasimpacted our our our history.
But, you know, looking at someof the different dates and, you
(02:31):
know, how long have humans beencultivating this plant, it's at
least three thousand years thatwe have been cultivating the
garden peony. And when we talkabout peonies, for the most part
there's different species outthere but for the most part, we
are talking about the Peonialactiflora.
It's also known as the Chinesepeony, the the garden peony, the
(02:54):
gar the common peony. So there'sessentially, this is what we're
all growing in our yards for themost part. There's gonna be def
definitely variations here, butthe most common one out there is
Paeonia lactiflora. And that isthe one that, you know, they
said, at least in Asian culture,they can trace that back at
least 3,000 years in in inhistorical documentation. So
(03:17):
it's it's been around for awhile, and it's been in people's
yards for quite a while too.
And it it it it it kinda movedits way from from Asia. There's
also European species, as well,but a lot of German immigrants
seem to bring this particularplant over to the North
Americas. And at least inWestern Illinois, where we're
(03:40):
located, there's a lot of Germanheritage folks here. And it
seems like everyone has a peonyin their yard that at some point
in time. So I have my my ownpeony in my yard.
I didn't plant it. It's just itwas there. So do you have plenty
of peonies in your yard, Ken?
Ken Johnson (03:59):
Yes. Our neighbor has a line, I guess, on the
property line. I'm not sure whothey actually belong to. Their
ours or theirs are split. And Iactually have one or two that I
dug from my grandparents' houseMhmm.
When we we sold their house. Sothose, I don't know how old
those are. I didn't rememberthem. I think they've been
around as long as I've beenalive. So
Chris Enroth (04:19):
Mhmm. And, like, I there's just so much diversity.
There's, like, from from colorto flower shape, even leaf shape
changes up. You know, as wementioned, we do have the the
common peony, which is a nonnative, but we do have two
native species of peony in NorthAmerica, but really nothing East
(04:44):
Of The Rocky Mountains. The twonative species are more western
species that you might findgrowing in every anywhere from,
like, California up to Oregon,another species up in
Washington, Idaho, you know,maybe Montana, places like that.
But for the most part, we do nothave any native peony species,
(05:05):
at least regionally here in theMidwest. It's it's all
cultivated species from fromAsia, Europe, you know, other
part other side of the planet.
Ken Johnson (05:15):
Yeah. I think there's well, there's something
like 30 some species dependingon on what taxonomy you read.
It's somewhere between twentyand fifty some species. I think
30 ish is usually what's agreedupon. So Mhmm.
There's there's a lot ofdifferent types, and you can get
straight species peonies. Ithink it's a little more of a
specialized market, a littlemore hardcore people growing
(05:36):
those. Like you said, yeah, it'susually those black flora or
hybrids, for herbaceous peoniesthat we're going be growing.
Mhmm. Yeah.
So there's also, the treepeonies, which aren't really
trees, they're more shrubs. Theyhave their perennial woody
stems. So with those, theydon't, you know, flopping isn't
(05:57):
as big of an issue. There's a oftimes they'll have much larger
flowers, wider range of flowercolors, can get into yellows and
stuff, with tree peonies. Ithink I've never grown them
because these are much moreexpensive, than the than the
abrasive types.
And then there's theintersectional or Ito peonies,
(06:17):
which are across betweenherbaceous and tree peonies. So
they they have the foliage of atree peony, which is it's got
lobes and stuff in it. It's notjust your your oval type that we
have for for herbaceous. So alittle more interesting looking
foliage, in my opinion. So theintersectional has though the
foliage of our our tree peonies,but it's not woody.
It's gonna die back to theground. And and again, it's got
(06:39):
a little more flower coloravailable in that. And I think
that's those bloom a little bitlater than the herbaceous. I
think from where I'd said treepeonies are blooming than than
the herbaceous types and thenthe intersectionals after that.
And even with the in theherbaceous, you've got different
bloom times within there forthat.
Mhmm.
Chris Enroth (06:59):
You know, I've I've never been able to get my
head wrapped around tree peoniesor even hydrangeas that are
trained as trees. I'm just like,woah. Slow down. I can't keep
up. I got to stick with myregular old herbaceous peony or
my regular old shrub hydrangea.
I'm like, it's, ah, let's notturn these things into trees. So
(07:20):
yeah, the options just over fullthey overload my brain a little
bit. But the options aredefinitely out there. I mean,
this is such a popular plant. Irecognize I didn't really
realize how common this plantwas, or peony, when it comes to,
like, cut flower arrangement.
There was a lot of theliterature that that I had
(07:41):
found. It was just, you know,this is how you grow peonies for
cut flowers, you know. And theydon't worry about, you know,
plants drooping down or stakingplants or anything like that
because they're cutting off allthe flowers. And so the I was
just surprised. And now that Igo and I think about the floral
arrangements, like, oh, yeah.
(08:02):
There's peonies in there. Andand then the production is
worldwide. It is global. Youknow, the biggest issue with
peony is that it's it's youcan't get this to bloom all year
long. So you have to go todifferent parts of the planet
throughout the year to thengrow, cultivate these, harvest
them, and then ship them to, youknow, planet wide to to fulfill
(08:26):
that that demand for peonyblooms in in bouquets.
And and I think, you know, theprimary thing is, one, they're
beautiful, and also, two, theythey smell wonderful. And so,
like, it's it's a big demand forcut flowers. And so North
Carolina state, they have theythey have a lot more information
on this. They have one of thebiggest peony farms in in the
(08:49):
country is gonna be in NorthCarolina. And so they their
their extension or theiruniversity has has more
information online if people areinterested in looking that up.
And they did a survey, and theyfound that peony is the second
most commonly grown cut flowerin The US. Now this is commonly
grown. So, like, if you're a cutflower grower, you probably have
(09:12):
a couple peonies somewhere onthe farm that you'll harvest
sometime throughout the year. Soit's not economic importance.
It's just, you know, you canfind it on a lot of cut flower
farms.
But and if you wanna know, youknow, I said second for peony,
what's the what's the mostpopular zinnia? The most
commonly grown cut flower iszinnia.
Ken Johnson (09:32):
Yeah, so common as in everybody grows them type
thing.
Chris Enroth (09:36):
Everybody grows them doesn't necessarily mean
they make the most money. Likethey don't have the biggest
economic impact, but you willfind them at almost every cut
flower farm.
Ken Johnson (09:46):
Yeah. I think that's I don't know. Peony is
like, well, you know, pickingyour favorite flowers like
picking your favorite kid. Itjust kinda depends on the day.
Mhmm.
But like peonies, know, whenthey're in bloom, that's
probably one of my favoriteflowers. There's the problem is
they don't bloom very long. Soyou got a short window Yes. To
enjoy them.
Chris Enroth (10:04):
Yes. And that's the big dish issue with cut
flowers is they they last, what,four or five days maybe before
they really so. Yeah. Yeah. Theystart to fade, and then, you
know, this just kind of becomesvery lackluster pretty quickly
as the the petals and everythingjust sort of begin to fall off
(10:26):
and droop off there.
So but the the thing the benefitto peonies and why they can grow
them around the world and shipthem is that if you get them
before the bloom opens, theystore really well. Like, they
can store for weeks at a time ina refrigerated setting. You
know, if you you if you cutthem, you know, at the right
(10:50):
stage of their flowerdevelopment, it's when you then
initiate that flower to thenopen. You you know, you've only
got a very short window in a ina floral arrangement for that
peony to to do its thing. Andusually, it's a a main
centerpiece because the flowerscan be the, you saucer shaped
sized plants.
Ken Johnson (11:09):
Mhmm. Because I we we teased it. Maybe we should
talk about cut flowers.
Chris Enroth (11:14):
I guess we should. We keep talking about it. Yeah.
Ken Johnson (11:16):
So so if you're if you've got peonies in your
landscape and you wanna enjoythem for more than, you know, a
couple weeks. So when thosethose flower buds start or
developing, once those sepals,the outer green wrapping on
leaves, once or on the flowerbuds, once that starts opening
up and you can start seeing thecolor of the the petals beneath.
(11:38):
So in my case, we've got white,flower peonies in our yard. So
once I start start seeing thatwhite, you kinda softly squeeze
those flower buds in the shed,like, I guess, the consistency
or the feel of, like, amarshmallow. I call them
marshmallow stage.
That's is that's when you wannacut those. You put them in
chilled water. I I don't dothis. I just let them grow on
(11:59):
the plant, but put them inchilled water for an hour or two
and then you can put them in therefrigerator, and they can last
three, four plus weeks, in thatrefrigerator setting, in that
marshmallow stage, put them out,take them out, warm them up, and
they'll open up and bloom foryou. You may lose a day or so
for the when the flowers open onthe lifespan.
(12:19):
So instead of five, six, sevendays, may lose lose a day off
that, but you're getting thoseweeks later than you normally
would off off that particularcultivar that you'd be
harvesting from.
Chris Enroth (12:31):
You know, I this is the time of year that you
would be going out, inspectingthose flower buds, you know,
squeezing them. Do they feellike a marshmallow or not? If
they do, you'd you'd cut themand you'd bring them inside,
throw them in a vase, throw themin the fridge, however you would
want to display them orwhenever, if you wanna delay it
like Ken had described. And,yeah, it's just it's that season
(12:53):
right now. And I I I rememberthe Illinois Veterans Home in
Quincy.
They have a memorial garden downthere that our master gardeners
work at, and it it it's arrangedvery symmetrically. So there's,
like, this main axis as you walkinto the garden. And then on
either side, there's these kindof these secondary axes then to
(13:19):
go either to your left or toyour right. And between these
two pathways on either side isjust this row of different types
of peonies. I'll see if I canfind a picture to to throw in
here that It it's enchanting.
You walk through there, smellsamazing. The the colors, the
(13:40):
flowers are just beautiful. SoI'm pretty sure I have a picture
I can send you, Ken. I think Iused it on the cover of one of
our events that we did.
Ken Johnson (13:48):
Good deal. Any I guess so and talking of
blooming, you mentioned thisearlier, we've got with our
herbaceous, so we're I thinktoday, we're focusing on
herbaceous. Mhmm. Ito and treepeonies are a show for a
different day. Have somebodyactually has grown those.
Talk about those. Yes. But withour herbaceous types, you know,
(14:10):
we've got early bloomers, midseason, and late season. So if
you're looking at a catalog, atimes they're going to be
categorized by bloom season. Sodespite only maybe blooming for
a week or two, for the cultivar,if you if you get different
cultivars and stuff, you canextend that bloom season or the
season where you have peonyblooms in your landscape if you
(14:30):
mix and match those bloomingperiods.
With that in, you know, say anygarden catalog that's selling
peonies is gonna should havethat information. Mhmm. Mean, I
know there's there's companiesor nurseries that that
specialize only in peonies, andthey will and they've got
catalogs. You know, some of thethe prices may wanna make you
(14:54):
cry when you look at them,especially for, like, the newer
introductions and stuff. Butyeah.
And then I think when you thinkof the, you know, how long these
plants can survive, you know,the amount of money you spend
may seem like a lot, but it'snot uncommon. I you always read
about it. It's not uncommon tohear plants living for a hundred
years. Mhmm. So it's it's a longterm investment when you're when
(15:18):
you're buying those reallyexpensive ones.
Chris Enroth (15:20):
Yes. If you're into collecting different types
of plants, this is definitely arabbit hole to fall into right
here. I was on the AmericanPeony Society website too just
looking at pictures of differenttypes that are registered with
them. There's some wild lookingones out there. Again, I don't
(15:40):
know how you might find them.
Again, you'd have to go to thosespecialty nurseries or join the
American Peony Society. I thinkthey have their annual show.
It's coming up. Coming up, Wasit in Wisconsin I saw? Or
there's some event going on inWisconsin, PNE related.
I don't know if it's theirannual national
Ken Johnson (16:01):
meeting. Yes. June, Beaver Dam, Wisconsin for 2025.
Chris Enroth (16:09):
We'll head up to Wisconsin because I if you have
permission from some of thepeople showcasing these flowers,
a lot of times you can collectthe pollen from these and but
we'll get into that here in alittle bit when we talk about
breeding. But but yeah. So, youknow, you can investigate that
more if you really wanna diveinto this wild peony collecting
(16:33):
mad person kind of thing.
Ken Johnson (16:37):
Yeah. We're looking at the the American Peony
Society website there. They havea peony registry, and they've
got 7,686 results for forcultivars that come back. So
there's a lot.
Chris Enroth (16:51):
And and we will get into towards the end of the
show, can you make your owncultivars of peonies? And, yes,
you can. Just like daylilies oriris, anything like that, you
can you can breed theseyourself.
Ken Johnson (17:03):
Should we get into the flower forms?
Chris Enroth (17:05):
Oh, yes. The ones that I have are are they're very
old fashioned. I they're notdouble flowered. But yes, Ken,
tell me about the differentflower forms because all I'm
growing is the single flowerform, which is very still very
large, beautiful. But, yeah,what you got?
Ken Johnson (17:24):
Yeah. So the the American Peony Society. So this
is coming from their website,and we can put a link in the
show notes if you wanna readthis for yourself. So they have,
what is it, six different formsof flower forms that they I
don't recognize is the rightterm, but they those are the the
standard or or six forms. Sothey've got single, Japanese,
(17:47):
anemone, bomb, semi double, andfull double.
So but the singles, these aremore like your your wild types.
You've got five petal five ormore petals. You have pollen
bearing stamens, functionalcarpals. So they have up to 15
petals that can still beclassified as singles, provided
this kind of a saucer, more ofan open type, flowers. Japanese,
(18:09):
they have stamenoids.
These are basically stamens thathave been transformed. So
they're still, like, kinda looklike singles, they're a little
more, the stamens are littlemore pedal like. And then
anemone, is similar to the tothe Japanese, but those stamens
are are larger. The stamenoidsare larger, look a little more
(18:30):
petal like. And then bomb, thestamens have become petals, on
there, and they're the samecolor, usually the same color,
as the the the true petals aswell.
And then semi double, they stillhave, promised stamens, in the
middle, but they've got more ofthose petals on the outside.
That's a little more full, alittle more, I guess, cup shaped
(18:52):
flower, than than saucer shaped.And then full double, you know,
it's it's basically nothing butpetals in there. The the stamens
are all converted into petalsand and all of that. So if you
go to the the American PeonySociety website, they've got
pictures of all of these, whichare much better than the the
crude descriptions I just gave.
Chris Enroth (19:15):
Well, I we were at a graduation party a few days
ago, and the house as we walkedin, they had a semi double
peony, which so that is the onethat still has the the,
prominent stamens, which Iremember they were yet this kind
of very bright yellow, stamenappearance right in the middle,
(19:37):
and then the petals were thisvery dark maroon red. It was
absolutely gorgeous. Maybe oneof my favorite combinations I've
seen for a while. Maybe thinkabout more about these different
flower shapes. I think I likethe semi double the best just
because you still maintain thatcenter color kind of variation
(20:06):
that might be a you know, it itcould be a complementary of some
of the petals.
But I just think it helps itstand out more. Now the full
doubles, I can understand whypeople like those. I mean,
they're wild looking. It's justa big ball of flower petals,
really. So, yeah, I the semidouble really stood out, though,
(20:26):
to me the other night.
So if I would be venturing intothe peony world, I'd probably
start there and maybe go intosome of those, like, the
Japanese flower types or anemoneflower types. How about you,
Ken? Do you have a a favorite?
Ken Johnson (20:44):
So the one we have I got from my grandparents, it's
it's either a bomb or a fulldouble.
Chris Enroth (20:48):
Mhmm.
Ken Johnson (20:50):
I think it's probably full double because
it's still got you know, thestatement sort of no pistols and
stuff are still there if youpeel back the pedals a little
bit. Yeah. I think I'm with you.Like, if, yeah, if I was picking
one, I think I would look gomore towards that. That semi
double type.
I I think it it looks becausesome of those stamens have been
(21:12):
formed into petals, but youstill have those there, they
like the the contrast, it justlooks like a this is a bigger,
bulkier looking flower than,like, the single. It's a little
more, I guess, meat to it, Iguess, for lack of a better
term. But, like, usually, whenI'm looking at beans up, I'm
usually more looking for thefragrance. Mhmm. Like, if I'm
(21:32):
only gonna have this thing for aweek or two, it better smell
pretty good.
Chris Enroth (21:37):
Yes. I I do a lot of stopping to smell the
flowers, and especially thistime of year, our roses have
started to bloom. And, we didn'tplant these roses either. They
just they were there by theprevious owner. So and they're
all kinda old fashioned.
They smell pretty good. Andthen, of course, the peonies,
I'm stopping, like, every time Iwalk by, take a whiff of that
(21:58):
because I'm like, ugh. It's onlygonna last for so long.
Ken Johnson (22:02):
Yeah. The the ones I got I got from my
grandparents, it's they areincredibly fragrant. I have no
idea what the the cultivar is.It's just the white. It's got
little pink streaks here andthere, but it's at times, it's
almost overwhelming, thefragrance they give off.
Chris Enroth (22:17):
Mhmm. So, Ken, probably the main question I get
about peonies related to andthis is related to blooms,
though I don't know if peoplerealize that it's quite related
to to blooming, is they willcall and they'll say, my my
plants, my peonies are coveredin ants. What do I need to spray
(22:37):
to get the ants off of the thepeonies? So, you know, what what
is going on here? Because I seeants on mine all the time, and
there's never any damage.
There's never any problem here.Are the ants hurting my peonies?
Ken Johnson (22:54):
Yeah. And I think the alternate to that question
is do the ants are ants requiredto help the flowers open up? I
think that's the other the otherside of that coin, that you hear
a lot. So the ants are they'rehelping the peonies, but they're
not doing anything with theflowers opening up. They're not
damaging them anyway.
So the the peonies and a lot ofother plants have extra floral
(23:15):
nectaries. So these are partssomewhere on the plant that
produce have these glands thatare gonna produce nectar. In the
case of peonies, they've gotthem on on the sepals and stuff
in the flower buds. Those arereleasing nectar. That's gonna
draw the ants in.
Ants are gonna feed on thatnectar, and ants are kind of
territorial. They're gonnadefend that food source. So if
you have any kind of pestscoming in there potentially, or
(23:36):
any other kind of insect,they're gonna chase them away,
to protect their food source.They're in a way, they're
protecting those flower buds byfeeding by the the peonies are
protecting those flower buds byproviding those ants, with the
food source. If don't have antson them, flowers are still gonna
open up, just fine.
And I think a lot of times whenwhen people are cutting them,
they've got ants on theirflowers, they're concerned. If
(23:56):
you're doing it in themarshmallow stage, just swish
them around with some water.Same thing with the flowers.
They're opened up, take the cutflower, dunk it in some water,
swish it around a little bit.Not so violently that the petals
are coming off, but just gentlyswish them around, ants will
come out, and then you can haveyour cut flowers.
And so usually, there's notgonna be enough ants on there
that even if you did bring a fewants in, it's it's not the end
(24:20):
of the world.
Chris Enroth (24:21):
Yeah. They they probably won't even survive in
your house to to figure out away out of your house. So Yes.
Ken Johnson (24:27):
They'll have no idea about Yeah.
Chris Enroth (24:30):
I did read one of the issues with those extra full
nectaries, you know, and alsothat that nectar sort of being
spread or or or on that that budas it's beginning to open. If
you do not have enough rainfall,if you have, like, a dry spring,
(24:52):
which we have had in in yearspast, the nectar can sometimes
make the petals or the sepalsstick to the petals. And so the
you might not get a completeopening of that flower bed.
That's more of an issue for alot of the cut flower growers
that are growing them in, like,a high tunnel. You know, they're
under some type of in some typeof structure, or they're not
(25:13):
getting rainfall over top of theplant washing off that that
excess nectar, sticky nectarthat might be holding those
sepals against those petals.
So that's that was the one issuethat I saw that if you just
don't have enough rainfall or,you know, might sometimes be a
good idea, spray the top ofthose flowers sometimes with a a
(25:36):
mist of water to wash some ofthat nectar off of there.
Ken Johnson (25:39):
Yes. But
Chris Enroth (25:41):
The yes. There's a but. Yes. Big but here because
there's some foliar diseaseissues when it comes to peonies
and staying excessively wet. So,yes, the but.
Ken Johnson (25:51):
Yeah. So with peonies, I think there's
probably three diseases, we mostcommonly get. Botrytis blight,
that's the one usually, we'reseeing this in the in the spring
even more of a cool wetconditions that it likes. It's
you know, if you've got youryour flower buds, they're
developing all of a sudden, theyturn kinda black and they or
(26:12):
brown and they don't open up.You're starting to get leaf
spots on the leaves.
That's more than likely thetragus. I know I saw in mine,
we've got a bunch of severalbuds that I think succumbed to
it. I don't know how becauseit's been pretty dry. Mhmm. And
then we've got peony measles,just another fungal disease, you
get the leaf spots.
(26:33):
And the botrytis blight and thepeony measles can look pretty
similar to one another, but youkinda get these reddish spots on
the leaves and the leaf blotchor the measles, like, on the
stems and stuff like that.Again, turn for kind of brownish
over time. And then we've gotpowdery mildew. So this is again
warm humid conditions that arelike some of getting these white
(26:55):
spots on leaves. And I thinkpowdery mildew is one we I think
we're seeing a little bit morecommonly or a little more
frequently
Chris Enroth (27:02):
Mhmm.
Ken Johnson (27:02):
Becoming a little more common, over the last
several years. And that could beI I think if you've got these
nice humid conditions don't havea lot of airflow through there,
that's really good, conditionsfor powdery mildew. We don't
have a lot of rain, that helpspowdery mildew as well. If we
get lot of rainfall, that washesthat stuff off. It's it's one of
the few diseases that doesn'tnecessarily like a lot of
(27:23):
moisture on the leaves.
So, you know, if we're gettinggetting drier, you've got these
really you got older plants thathave a really thick canopy and
stuff and have a lot of airflowthrough there. You maybe could
have in pretty good conditionsfor, powdery mildew.
Fortunately, with these thesediseases, though, if if you've
got healthy, well establishedplants, they're probably not
(27:44):
gonna they're gonna look ugly,but it's not really gonna affect
the the overall health of theplant too tremendously. I mean,
with botrytis, you're gonna losesome flowers, which is the
reason we're growing them. Butthe the, like, the long term
health, if you've got a healthy,well established plant, it's
it's not too big of a concernthat we're not necessarily
getting really worked up, overfor some of these diseases.
(28:06):
And you could be pruning out.And if you've got a couple of
leaves that are really badlyinfected, prune those out,
dispose of them. Make sure whenyou're doing this, it's not wet
when you're handling the plantsso you're not spreading those
pathogens. You can usefungicides. Again, if you have,
like, the Trias or something,you're doing that early in the
season, because the thefungicides aren't once those
those plant tissues areinfected, the fungicide is not
(28:29):
gonna kill off that.
That's still gonna be infected.You're bay basically trying to
prevent the spread. So once it'sthere, you're preventing that
trying to prevent that fromspreading instead of kinda
curing those infected parts.
Chris Enroth (28:44):
Mine get powdery mildew at the end of every year,
it seems like. Just towards theend of summer, they get powdery
mildew. I do nothing about it.And they come back every year
nice and healthy.
Ken Johnson (28:58):
Yeah. Anything like garden, cleaning up the the the
leaves and stuff at the end ofthe year, could help reduce that
inoculum Mhmm. As well. And Idon't do a very good job of
that, but I still get I stillget flowers. They may look a
little ragged, especiallytowards the end of the season,
but they're still coming back.
Chris Enroth (29:18):
That's right. They're tough plants. That's why
that's why they're ineverybody's yard from
grandparents or inherited insome form or fashion that you
you've you've gotten them inthat way.
Ken Johnson (29:31):
At least in the Northern US.
Chris Enroth (29:33):
Yes.
Ken Johnson (29:34):
Can't can't grow them down south. So I think a
lot of times, you know, a littletangent here. Know, a lot of
times we get zone envy. Youknow, like, oh, they can grow
this cool tropical stuff or warmwarmer stuff that requires
warmer climate down south, butcan't grow peonies, can't grow
lilacs, spring blooming bulbs.You gotta buy those new every
(29:54):
year because you don't haveenough chilling requirement for
them.
So I think, you know, sometimesin the North, we we get jealous
of some of the stuff they cangrow down south, but I think it
goes both ways a little bit too.Yes.
Chris Enroth (30:07):
Yes. This is not a Southern species. This is a, you
know, a good Midwestern andNorthern US plant. Yeah.
Ken Johnson (30:17):
They were the zone seven, eight. It's kind of the
cutoff where you don't getenough cold temperatures Yes. In
the winter for it to to bloomproperly. Plant may grow, but
you're not gonna get much, ifanything, for blooms.
Chris Enroth (30:32):
Yeah. Mhmm. Well, I guess if you have taken this
plant, like, from agrandparent's house or, you
know, if you have have a peonyand it's not where you want it.
I've heard, and I Ken and I youand I were talking like, oh,
people say you can't move thesethings. I have successfully
(30:54):
moved peonies.
You know, what what methodswould be recommended for taking
a peony from one spot in theyard and moving it to a
different or taking it from oneyard and moving it to a totally
different yard?
Ken Johnson (31:07):
Yeah. So I think this you know, they don't
necessarily like their rootsgetting disturbed a lot, so you
wanna try to when you're diggingthem, get as much of that root
ball. Mhmm. You know, I dug theones for my grandparents. I
mean, I had a massive root ball.
And I actually I don't recommenddoing this, but that survived
out of the soil in that giantroot ball in a basically a
(31:28):
garbage hand for for monthsbefore I got it in the ground.
And it was a little rough in thebeginning, but it it survived.
I'm not saying you should dothis, but I think they're a
little a little hardier than wegive them credit for Mhmm. A lot
of times. But, yeah, try not todisturb the root system.
Get as big of a root ball as youpossibly can. The it was
(31:49):
written, you know, those rootsare kinda stiff. And sometimes,
you know, if you get that soiloff and let them sit for a
little bit, they become a littlemore pliable. So you're less
prone to breaking them, if youif you can do that. I mean, I
think the big thing is, youknow, doing doing this in the
fall is gonna be the best timeand getting as much of that root
ball and trying to disturb thatas little as possible if you're
(32:11):
if you're gonna be moving theentire plant.
Mhmm. If you're gonna bedividing it, you know, then
you're you're you're cutting itup. You're trying to get, what
was it, four or five, as yourshoots coming off the sections.
So you're you're gonna becutting it up. And so there's
gonna be a little more, It getsdamaged under the plant.
So that's it may take a littlebit of time for that to recover.
(32:33):
It may may not bloom or yourfewer blooms out those first
year or two, but then as it getsrecovers and gets established,
you'll be back to the way itshould be, so to speak. Mhmm.
Chris Enroth (32:44):
You're right. They they are tough plants. We we
bought our house that we aremoved into right now. We bought
it in we moved in in October. Soif there were any peonies
around, they got hit by thefrost that had already occurred.
They were gone, or or I justdidn't even notice them. And
that's because they were growingin the lawn. Like, there were
(33:05):
several spots just you know,next spring, I saw this peony
leaves start coming up. I'mlike, well, these are just
growing in the lawn. So I thinkthe lawn care company that was
had been mowing the that lawnfor years before we had owned
that house, I think they werejust mowing them.
And I just saw them growing upin the spring, and I said, well,
(33:30):
they are in the middle of thelawn. We're gonna try to start
to establish a few, you know,beds here, sort of shape or form
more of a a space as opposed tohaving flowers growing up in the
middle of of the lawn. You know,shrubs in the middle of the
lawn. I don't want that. And soI dug them up in the spring.
We divided them. I think I got,like, five plants kind of there
(33:55):
was there a few clusters ofpeonies that grow in the lawn,
and I sort of divided them andbroke them up into five separate
different plants. I think a fewof them I think maybe two of
them didn't establish, but theother three did establish. And
even after I dug them up anddivided them, more peony foliage
kept coming up in the same spotin the lawn. And so I dig those
(34:18):
up.
And so from all of that, I haveseveral in my yard. And also,
you know, I I try to do it thebest way. Try to keep put as
keep as much soil intact aroundthe roots as I could. Every time
I mow, I I hit the divots thatI've created. And I'm like, oh,
this is gonna be a rough bumpright here.
(34:39):
I tried to fill it in with withsoil, but I I dug a big hole and
when I dug out those roots.
Ken Johnson (34:47):
And I think when when you think about it, when
the peonies are buying, most ofthose are being divided. You
know, we've got the thesenurseries that are growing these
peony plants, and that's howthey're getting propagated.
They're digging these plants,and dividing them every few
years. Forever, it's easier todivide the younger plants as
they get bigger. You know,sometimes that that center
(35:07):
starts dying out, like a lot ofother plants, you know, it
becomes more on the periphery.
So, you know, the youngerplants, that's usually what
they're dividing up and thenbuilding up their stock. And
then once they get enough, thenthen they can sell them. So it's
Mhmm. Yeah. It's in the in thetrade and the commercial level,
they're constantly getting dugand divided and and moving
(35:29):
around and stuff.
Chris Enroth (35:31):
Well, in in in reading more about peonies, I
saw there's a lot of differentways that you can propagate
them. There's people that willuse leaf cuttings, stem
cuttings, you know, and andthey'll root those in a
propagation media, and they'llthey'll grow those out. And
there's a lot of ways to dothis, and you can even grow them
(35:53):
from seeds. So you can breedyour own peonies. And it it is
kind of an an involved process.
I don't think it's any morecomplicated necessarily than any
than, you know, doing this witha daylily. But it it definitely
takes a long time. So if youwould say cross pollen with with
one male, you know, the the bitpollen from one flower, put that
(36:17):
on a female flower part of adifferent flower, cross those,
try to breed differentcharacteristics. It could take
you you know, it could be, like,four to five years before you
see your first bloomnecessarily, and it would take
maybe five to seven years beforeyou actually see that plant come
into a more mature form, youknow, lots of flowers. What will
(36:40):
the leaves really look like?
You know? What's the habit ofthis plant? Do the leaves fall
down, or do they stay upright?Are they strong stems? And so
peony breeding is an exercise inpatience.
So the the best way to do this,though, is if you are interested
in in in in peony breeding, isprobably, you know, look up
(37:04):
there's a lot of guides onlineon how to do this. The American
Peony Society has has a reallygood guide on on how to to breed
these. And but but generallyspeaking, you would take go from
one flower, and you're selectingflowers that you like or the
habit or leaves that you like.And then you you go to another
(37:26):
female plant, and you're you'rejust finding characteristics
that you like. A lot of plantbreeding starts out as just a
guessing.
And you're just you don't reallyhave necessarily a big goal in
mind, but you're just like, Ilike this. I like that. Let's
see if I can get something thatresembles both of these
characteristics in one plant. Soyou take the the male flower
anthers or the the pollen fromthose, And you would then remove
(37:51):
all of the petals and all of themale flower parts of that you're
going to be pollinating. So thethe female flower parts, those
will remain, and and you removeeverything off of there.
And then you would then, withyour finger, try to brush the
anthers onto that female, thethe ovary, the stigma there. And
(38:12):
even if it doesn't seem like theit would stick, the pollen's
pretty sticky, and it willadhere itself to there. Even if
maybe the female flower is notquite ready to receive it, the
pollen will stick. And in a fewdays, everything should line up
for both the pollen and thefemale flower parts. So and then
(38:34):
once you do that, you have tocover that flower with some type
of some type of envelope, youknow, mesh bag, anything to
prevent pollen from reachingthat flower that you don't want
to pollinate that flower.
The other thing too, so let'ssay you go to somebody's house,
(38:55):
you like their peony, and youhave to then transport that
pollen somewhere else, it wouldbe recommended that you would
store those anthers in like apaper envelope, something that
breathes. You could do it in aplastic baggie, but you have to
make sure that that pollen canthen dry to then be received by
the female flower part. So Iguess one step that I did forget
(39:18):
is a lot of times breeders willtake that pollen, they'll put it
on a piece of tinfoil, and thenthey will shine like a, you
know, a incandescent or aincandescent light on it that
kind of dries it out over thecourse of a day. And that dries
it out, but not using excessheat, and then that pollen is
(39:38):
then ready to then go on to thatfemale flower part. So there's
and then you just wait, andseeds will develop by the end of
the growing season.
You'll harvest those, and youcan plant those right away as
soon as you get those seeds, andyou can begin to germinate them.
But they will grow a root, butthey will not grow leaves
(40:00):
because they're waiting to gothrough two types of
stratification. Again, that warmstratification that gets that
root to grow, then it needs togo through winter that will then
trigger that vegetative growthto then ensue. So you're gonna
be waiting at least a yearbefore you see your first leaf
pop up. And then once you seeonce you see that you have
(40:20):
leaves in that next year, youcan then pot those up and then
they can, you know, you can growthem out and and have several
varieties that's you know,whichever you'd want.
Ken Johnson (40:32):
And then you do if you are doing your own breeding,
you'll probably end up tossingnot necessarily tossing, but
more often than not, the thewhat you're gonna get isn't
gonna be anything spectacular. Ithink it's usually kinda few and
far between where you'd havesomething that would be
worthwhile trying to topropagate out and and get more
of, at least at a commerciallevel. If your personal level
(40:54):
doesn't really matter. But
Chris Enroth (40:57):
Then I wanted to share something. So one of our
master gardeners, Sue Marshall,she had put together this
historic story about a nurseryin Macomb called Peony Dale. And
this is by, again, Germanimmigrants. They had first
settled in McDonough Countyabout, like oh, let's see. I can
(41:23):
actually find the dates here.
Sue did a lot of research onthis. They arrived around, let's
see, 1840, '18 '80. The name ofthis family was the Wettengals,
and so Charles Wettengaulimmigrated here from Germany. He
settled in near Colchester in1850 and opened a shoe store.
(41:45):
They purchased 80 acres offormer military track land, and
eventually, they owned a wholesection.
So a 60 acres, they eventuallypurchased near Colchester, which
is by Macomb in WesternIllinois. They had six children.
One of these children, his namewas Charles, and he was the one
(42:08):
who established Peony Dale in1898. He was essentially as a
child, he was just in a curiousnaturalist. He collected prairie
plants.
He would go to the woods as he'swalking back and forth to
school, and he would justcollect them and start growing
them at his farm. His parentsweren't really thrilled with
(42:31):
this hobby because it's theysaid that it it distracted from
his other schoolwork and chores,but they they let him do that.
And so at that point in time,peonies were imported quite a
bit from Holland and France, andblooms were were in high demand.
(42:51):
So peonies were, you know, backin the eighteen hundreds were a
very popular cut flower. And sonurseries started popping up
these, like, little ones allthroughout from, like, the East
Coast moving into the Midwest.
So Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin,Illinois, they were pretty big
peony growers, you know, back inthe late eighteen hundreds,
(43:12):
early '19 hundreds. And so whenCharlie, this young boy, when he
was 14, he ordered his firstpeony from France. It was 1898.
Then he started ordering plantsfrom Holland. He held a flower
show in 1910, and he made $75back then, which was a lot of
money, you know, for a youngboy.
(43:32):
And he just continued to buy andcultivate peonies. You know,
eventually, would take wagons ofcut flowers from the Comb Train
Station. He'd he'd go all theway into Chicago to sell them.
His inventory was so big. Sokinda fast forward to 1935, he
had 200,000 plants.
And by 1955, there was anarticle that wrote that
(43:56):
thousands of people would comevisit Peony Dale or Peony Dale
during the growing season. So,essentially, I you know, Sue,
she tracked down some of histheir descendants. I think
they're out in Oklahoma now,but, you know, they were really
fascinated by the story of, youknow, their their grandfather
(44:17):
and and things. And so, youknow, they're always looking for
these stories. And they foundout, you know, that they found
some old notes of of Charlie's,and he had developed 11
varieties that are registeredwith the American Peony Society,
but there's no pictures of them.
There's just his notes and hislists. And so, you know, there
(44:43):
was sort of this little movementfew years ago to try to see if
we could find any of them. Idon't think they really could.
But, yeah, we I have his listright here. And a lot it seems
like a lot of peonies are namedafter people.
Right? Like, there's the Mhmm.Sarah Bernhardt, the one of the
more popular ones, which I, forsome reason, kept thinking of
(45:05):
Sandra Bernhardt, the comedian.Like, why would they name a
peony after Sandra Bernhardt,the comedian? But it's Sarah
Bernhardt.
But, yeah, some of his varietiesare Beacon Light, one named
after him, Charles, ClaraStockwell, Georgette, Irma, the
Lucy Dunn, the white filiform,Lothario, the Margaret
(45:30):
Vereheller, Martha v Lane,Martha I a Tieman, missus w d
Bennett, missus or w l Miller,the Torridor, Sarah m
Wettengall, which I think washis mother's name. So, yeah,
those are his his 11 registeredwith the American Peony Society.
(45:54):
And it's just I think smalltowns in the Midwest have these
stories about Mhmm. Thisparticular plant. So, yeah, it's
a little trip down, a littlehistorical lane.
And so they actually have adisplay in our local museum
about Peony Dale.
Ken Johnson (46:10):
So what happened to it?
Chris Enroth (46:13):
It's it's sort of so Sue went to visit this farm,
and it just sort of has returnedback to the land, so to speak.
So, there's definitely justpeonies growing wild throughout
this 60 acres, but it's alsogrown up in trees, oaks, and
(46:36):
hickories, all these otherplants that he collected. So,
you know, Sue said it's it'sit's beautiful. It's
breathtaking. It's stunning, butnobody knows it's there.
It's hard to get to now. It'sjust this old farm that, you
know, grew thousands andthousands of different types of
(46:57):
plants, many of them peoniespeonies. And, yeah, it's just it
I would love to go visit itright now this time of year.
Ken Johnson (47:08):
Field trip.
Chris Enroth (47:09):
Let's go. We gotta find it first. Sue will give us
directions. But yeah. So, yeah,that that yes.
Little trip down looking lookingback. But I think can we other
than the ants, there's anotherbig question that we get is,
like, you know, why aren't mypeonies blooming? And we talked
(47:34):
about cold. Is is that theissue? Is they're just not
getting cold enough in thewinter?
Ken Johnson (47:39):
In the Midwest, probably not. If you're a little
further south, that that couldbe an issue. But there's
probably well, there can bemultiple reasons as to why. I
think some of more common onesis plants are planted too deep.
Those really, those eyes shouldonly be, like, an inch or two
below the ground.
They get too deep. Sometimesthey are not gonna bloom.
There's also they may be liftingthe plants up, getting too much
(48:01):
shade. The beans we have in ouryard, think that's starting to
become a little bit of an issue.They're not still producing
flowers, not quite as many aswhen we first got them in there.
Some of the trees nearby are aregetting bigger, casting more of
a shadow. So they are full sunplants. So, you know and again,
they are long lived. So you mayhave had one that you planted
thirty years ago when that treewas really small and not casting
(48:22):
a shadow on it, and now it is.So there may be time to dig that
plant and move it.
Those are probably the two mostcommon reasons. We talked about
the botrytis blight. Well, thatthat gets in there. That can
kill the flower buds. You know,if it's a newer plant and the
companies are specializing inpeonies, you're gonna get ones
(48:44):
with plenty of eyes and stuff onit.
You're getting real cheap onesfrom the garden center,
something like that that come ina bag. Those may be a little bit
smaller, so they just need mayneed time in order to get
established to get big enough toreally start putting out a lot
of flowers and stuff. So smallclumps, plants are just getting
really big and crowded. They maypotentially benefit from from
(49:07):
being split up too. And I don'tI don't think people usually
fertilize them much, but maybeif they're next to a lawn and
you're dumping a lot of nitrogenfertilizer on there, your
nitrogen is really gonna pushthat foliage growth.
A lot of times, they're theexpensive flowering. So it's
probably not all that common,but I think a potential,
especially if you've if you'refertilizing lawn quite a bit,
(49:29):
nearby. Just, I guess, some ofmore common, reasons why we may
not be be seeing flowers andstuff, on them.
Chris Enroth (49:39):
And that is why we grow them. And so, you know,
we're we're worried about theants hurting the flowers or
whether the ants are part of theflowers opening or why aren't
they blooming. And, you so I Isort of forget about my peonies
once they're done blooming.They're still there. I leave the
foliage up, but I I I sort offorget about them.
(50:00):
They they vanish into thebackground. Other plants sort of
come in and fill the play thethe the the area around there.
Ken Johnson (50:06):
And I guess not that we're talking about cold
weather, you if get a latefrost, a hard frost or something
that could nip the buds on youtoo. There's not much you can do
about that. Yeah.
Chris Enroth (50:18):
Well, that was a lot of great information about
peonies, a favorite of mine thistime of year. I absolutely love
this plant. I'm excited to goback home so I can go watch and
see what happens this today. Youknow, after the rain, they'll
they'll perk back up hopefully,open up bloom, get a good scent
of this kind of that sweetsmelling flower that many of us
(50:41):
have in our landscapes. And ifyou don't have it, you know,
there we talked about ways youcan plant them, divide them,
plant seeds if you can have thepatience to wait long enough.
Well, the Good Growing podcastproduction of University of
Illinois Extension edited thisweek by Ken Johnson. And Ken,
thanks so much for hanging outtalking about a delightful
(51:03):
spring blooming perennial.
Ken Johnson (51:06):
Yes. Thank you. I'm gonna go home and go smell some
peonies and everything will beokay for the rest of the day.
Chris Enroth (51:13):
That's right. Yes. We'll just keep the storms away
so they don't keep blowing over.
Ken Johnson (51:19):
And let's do this again next week.
Chris Enroth (51:21):
Oh, we shall do this again next week. The
horticultural hijinks shallcontinue on the Good Growing
podcast. Well, listeners, thankyou for doing what you do best,
and that is listening. Or ifyou're watching us on YouTube,
watching. And as always, keep ongrowing.
(51:47):
Well, that was a lot of greatinformation about the peonies.
Peonies? I think I might havesaid both over the course of the
show. So, yeah, that was a oh,what did I what am I talking
about? That was nope.
Alright. Sorry, we can't. Let mejust start over. It's getting
(52:08):
dark. I think it's gonna rainagain.
Take two.
Welcome to the Good Growing podcast. I am Chris
Enroth, horticulture educatorwith University of Illinois
Extension coming at you fromMacomb, Illinois, and we have
got a great show for you today.Peonies? Peonies? We're gonna be
talking about this favoritespring blooming plant, which has
(00:25):
its own variation of names liketomato tomahto, potato potato.
But you know, I'm not doing thisby myself. I am joined as always
every single week byhorticulture educator Ken
Johnson in Jacksonville. Hey,Ken.
Ken Johnson (00:36):
Hello, Chris. I think it's peony.
Chris Enroth (00:39):
Peony. Why I
Ken Johnson: That's the way I've always said (00:40):
undefined
it anyway.
Chris Enroth (00:42):
That's how I've I've done it as well. The peony.
The peony. Your folks are gonnahear all different ways to
pronounce this plant today. So,yeah, feel free to put your own
phonetical twist on this plantin the comments below.
Oh, well, Ken, I I do have tosay sort of related to peonies
(01:07):
that it has been very dry, andnow it is very wet. It has
rained a lot, and all of thepeonies are just completely
flopped over in my yard. Like,what the heck just happened? We
got a downpour last night. Howabout you?
Did you get some good rain?
Ken Johnson (01:27):
Yeah. Plus so we got about an inch, and I haven't
checked I didn't check thepeonies in our yard, but driving
the kids to school, there's alot of I won't say flattened,
but a lot of peonies where theflowers are much closer to the
ground than they were the daybefore.
Chris Enroth (01:44):
And, usually, they rebound somewhat. But sometimes,
you know, the those flowers,they're pretty big. They kind of
just almost as naturally willdroop towards the ground. So I
guess we'll talk about all thattoday.
Ken Johnson (02:00):
Yes. I think especially the I will get into
flower forms like the doubles. Ithink those hold a lot of water
too, and that just down they go.
Chris Enroth (02:09):
Yes. Yes. Well, there's a lot of history when it
comes to the peony, and I thinkit it's gonna be mentioned
throughout today's show, youknow, these different different
ways that this plant hasimpacted our our our history.
But, you know, looking at someof the different dates and, you
(02:31):
know, how long have humans beencultivating this plant, it's at
least three thousand years thatwe have been cultivating the
garden peony. And when we talkabout peonies, for the most part
there's different species outthere but for the most part, we
are talking about the Peonialactiflora.
It's also known as the Chinesepeony, the the garden peony, the
(02:54):
gar the common peony. So there'sessentially, this is what we're
all growing in our yards for themost part. There's gonna be def
definitely variations here, butthe most common one out there is
Paeonia lactiflora. And that isthe one that, you know, they
said, at least in Asian culture,they can trace that back at
least 3,000 years in in inhistorical documentation. So
(03:17):
it's it's been around for awhile, and it's been in people's
yards for quite a while too.
And it it it it it kinda movedits way from from Asia. There's
also European species, as well,but a lot of German immigrants
seem to bring this particularplant over to the North
Americas. And at least inWestern Illinois, where we're
(03:40):
located, there's a lot of Germanheritage folks here. And it
seems like everyone has a peonyin their yard that at some point
in time. So I have my my ownpeony in my yard.
I didn't plant it. It's just itwas there. So do you have plenty
of peonies in your yard, Ken?
Ken Johnson (03:59):
Yes. Our neighbor has a line, I guess, on the
property line. I'm not sure whothey actually belong to. Their
ours or theirs are split. And Iactually have one or two that I
dug from my grandparents' houseMhmm.
When we we sold their house. Sothose, I don't know how old
those are. I didn't rememberthem. I think they've been
around as long as I've beenalive. So
Chris Enroth (04:19):
Mhmm. And, like, I there's just so much diversity.
There's, like, from from colorto flower shape, even leaf shape
changes up. You know, as wementioned, we do have the the
common peony, which is a nonnative, but we do have two
native species of peony in NorthAmerica, but really nothing East
(04:44):
Of The Rocky Mountains. The twonative species are more western
species that you might findgrowing in every anywhere from,
like, California up to Oregon,another species up in
Washington, Idaho, you know,maybe Montana, places like that.
But for the most part, we do nothave any native peony species,
(05:05):
at least regionally here in theMidwest. It's it's all
cultivated species from fromAsia, Europe, you know, other
part other side of the planet.
Ken Johnson (05:15):
Yeah. I think there's well, there's something
like 30 some species dependingon on what taxonomy you read.
It's somewhere between twentyand fifty some species. I think
30 ish is usually what's agreedupon. So Mhmm.
There's there's a lot ofdifferent types, and you can get
straight species peonies. Ithink it's a little more of a
specialized market, a littlemore hardcore people growing
(05:36):
those. Like you said, yeah, it'susually those black flora or
hybrids, for herbaceous peoniesthat we're going be growing.
Mhmm. Yeah.
So there's also, the treepeonies, which aren't really
trees, they're more shrubs. Theyhave their perennial woody
stems. So with those, theydon't, you know, flopping isn't
(05:57):
as big of an issue. There's a oftimes they'll have much larger
flowers, wider range of flowercolors, can get into yellows and
stuff, with tree peonies. Ithink I've never grown them
because these are much moreexpensive, than the than the
abrasive types.
And then there's theintersectional or Ito peonies,
(06:17):
which are across betweenherbaceous and tree peonies. So
they they have the foliage of atree peony, which is it's got
lobes and stuff in it. It's notjust your your oval type that we
have for for herbaceous. So alittle more interesting looking
foliage, in my opinion. So theintersectional has though the
foliage of our our tree peonies,but it's not woody.
It's gonna die back to theground. And and again, it's got
(06:39):
a little more flower coloravailable in that. And I think
that's those bloom a little bitlater than the herbaceous. I
think from where I'd said treepeonies are blooming than than
the herbaceous types and thenthe intersectionals after that.
And even with the in theherbaceous, you've got different
bloom times within there forthat.
Mhmm.
Chris Enroth (06:59):
You know, I've I've never been able to get my
head wrapped around tree peoniesor even hydrangeas that are
trained as trees. I'm just like,woah. Slow down. I can't keep
up. I got to stick with myregular old herbaceous peony or
my regular old shrub hydrangea.
I'm like, it's, ah, let's notturn these things into trees. So
(07:20):
yeah, the options just over fullthey overload my brain a little
bit. But the options aredefinitely out there. I mean,
this is such a popular plant. Irecognize I didn't really
realize how common this plantwas, or peony, when it comes to,
like, cut flower arrangement.
There was a lot of theliterature that that I had
(07:41):
found. It was just, you know,this is how you grow peonies for
cut flowers, you know. And theydon't worry about, you know,
plants drooping down or stakingplants or anything like that
because they're cutting off allthe flowers. And so the I was
just surprised. And now that Igo and I think about the floral
arrangements, like, oh, yeah.
(08:02):
There's peonies in there. Andand then the production is
worldwide. It is global. Youknow, the biggest issue with
peony is that it's it's youcan't get this to bloom all year
long. So you have to go todifferent parts of the planet
throughout the year to thengrow, cultivate these, harvest
them, and then ship them to, youknow, planet wide to to fulfill
(08:26):
that that demand for peonyblooms in in bouquets.
And and I think, you know, theprimary thing is, one, they're
beautiful, and also, two, theythey smell wonderful. And so,
like, it's it's a big demand forcut flowers. And so North
Carolina state, they have theythey have a lot more information
on this. They have one of thebiggest peony farms in in the
(08:49):
country is gonna be in NorthCarolina. And so they their
their extension or theiruniversity has has more
information online if people areinterested in looking that up.
And they did a survey, and theyfound that peony is the second
most commonly grown cut flowerin The US. Now this is commonly
grown. So, like, if you're a cutflower grower, you probably have
(09:12):
a couple peonies somewhere onthe farm that you'll harvest
sometime throughout the year. Soit's not economic importance.
It's just, you know, you canfind it on a lot of cut flower
farms.
But and if you wanna know, youknow, I said second for peony,
what's the what's the mostpopular zinnia? The most
commonly grown cut flower iszinnia.
Ken Johnson (09:32):
Yeah, so common as in everybody grows them type
thing.
Chris Enroth (09:36):
Everybody grows them doesn't necessarily mean
they make the most money. Likethey don't have the biggest
economic impact, but you willfind them at almost every cut
flower farm.
Ken Johnson (09:46):
Yeah. I think that's I don't know. Peony is
like, well, you know, pickingyour favorite flowers like
picking your favorite kid. Itjust kinda depends on the day.
Mhmm.
But like peonies, know, whenthey're in bloom, that's
probably one of my favoriteflowers. There's the problem is
they don't bloom very long. Soyou got a short window Yes. To
enjoy them.
Chris Enroth (10:04):
Yes. And that's the big dish issue with cut
flowers is they they last, what,four or five days maybe before
they really so. Yeah. Yeah. Theystart to fade, and then, you
know, this just kind of becomesvery lackluster pretty quickly
as the the petals and everythingjust sort of begin to fall off
(10:26):
and droop off there.
So but the the thing the benefitto peonies and why they can grow
them around the world and shipthem is that if you get them
before the bloom opens, theystore really well. Like, they
can store for weeks at a time ina refrigerated setting. You
know, if you you if you cutthem, you know, at the right
(10:50):
stage of their flowerdevelopment, it's when you then
initiate that flower to thenopen. You you know, you've only
got a very short window in a ina floral arrangement for that
peony to to do its thing. Andusually, it's a a main
centerpiece because the flowerscan be the, you saucer shaped
sized plants.
Ken Johnson (11:09):
Mhmm. Because I we we teased it. Maybe we should
talk about cut flowers.
Chris Enroth (11:14):
I guess we should. We keep talking about it. Yeah.
Ken Johnson (11:16):
So so if you're if you've got peonies in your
landscape and you wanna enjoythem for more than, you know, a
couple weeks. So when thosethose flower buds start or
developing, once those sepals,the outer green wrapping on
leaves, once or on the flowerbuds, once that starts opening
up and you can start seeing thecolor of the the petals beneath.
(11:38):
So in my case, we've got white,flower peonies in our yard. So
once I start start seeing thatwhite, you kinda softly squeeze
those flower buds in the shed,like, I guess, the consistency
or the feel of, like, amarshmallow. I call them
marshmallow stage.
That's is that's when you wannacut those. You put them in
chilled water. I I don't dothis. I just let them grow on
(11:59):
the plant, but put them inchilled water for an hour or two
and then you can put them in therefrigerator, and they can last
three, four plus weeks, in thatrefrigerator setting, in that
marshmallow stage, put them out,take them out, warm them up, and
they'll open up and bloom foryou. You may lose a day or so
for the when the flowers open onthe lifespan.
(12:19):
So instead of five, six, sevendays, may lose lose a day off
that, but you're getting thoseweeks later than you normally
would off off that particularcultivar that you'd be
harvesting from.
Chris Enroth (12:31):
You know, I this is the time of year that you
would be going out, inspectingthose flower buds, you know,
squeezing them. Do they feellike a marshmallow or not? If
they do, you'd you'd cut themand you'd bring them inside,
throw them in a vase, throw themin the fridge, however you would
want to display them orwhenever, if you wanna delay it
like Ken had described. And,yeah, it's just it's that season
(12:53):
right now. And I I I rememberthe Illinois Veterans Home in
Quincy.
They have a memorial garden downthere that our master gardeners
work at, and it it it's arrangedvery symmetrically. So there's,
like, this main axis as you walkinto the garden. And then on
either side, there's these kindof these secondary axes then to
(13:19):
go either to your left or toyour right. And between these
two pathways on either side isjust this row of different types
of peonies. I'll see if I canfind a picture to to throw in
here that It it's enchanting.
You walk through there, smellsamazing. The the colors, the
(13:40):
flowers are just beautiful. SoI'm pretty sure I have a picture
I can send you, Ken. I think Iused it on the cover of one of
our events that we did.
Ken Johnson (13:48):
Good deal. Any I guess so and talking of
blooming, you mentioned thisearlier, we've got with our
herbaceous, so we're I thinktoday, we're focusing on
herbaceous. Mhmm. Ito and treepeonies are a show for a
different day. Have somebodyactually has grown those.
Talk about those. Yes. But withour herbaceous types, you know,
(14:10):
we've got early bloomers, midseason, and late season. So if
you're looking at a catalog, atimes they're going to be
categorized by bloom season. Sodespite only maybe blooming for
a week or two, for the cultivar,if you if you get different
cultivars and stuff, you canextend that bloom season or the
season where you have peonyblooms in your landscape if you
(14:30):
mix and match those bloomingperiods.
With that in, you know, say anygarden catalog that's selling
peonies is gonna should havethat information. Mhmm. Mean, I
know there's there's companiesor nurseries that that
specialize only in peonies, andthey will and they've got
catalogs. You know, some of thethe prices may wanna make you
(14:54):
cry when you look at them,especially for, like, the newer
introductions and stuff. Butyeah.
And then I think when you thinkof the, you know, how long these
plants can survive, you know,the amount of money you spend
may seem like a lot, but it'snot uncommon. I you always read
about it. It's not uncommon tohear plants living for a hundred
years. Mhmm. So it's it's a longterm investment when you're when
(15:18):
you're buying those reallyexpensive ones.
Chris Enroth (15:20):
Yes. If you're into collecting different types
of plants, this is definitely arabbit hole to fall into right
here. I was on the AmericanPeony Society website too just
looking at pictures of differenttypes that are registered with
them. There's some wild lookingones out there. Again, I don't
(15:40):
know how you might find them.
Again, you'd have to go to thosespecialty nurseries or join the
American Peony Society. I thinkthey have their annual show.
It's coming up. Coming up, Wasit in Wisconsin I saw? Or
there's some event going on inWisconsin, PNE related.
I don't know if it's theirannual national
Ken Johnson (16:01):
meeting. Yes. June, Beaver Dam, Wisconsin for 2025.
Chris Enroth (16:09):
We'll head up to Wisconsin because I if you have
permission from some of thepeople showcasing these flowers,
a lot of times you can collectthe pollen from these and but
we'll get into that here in alittle bit when we talk about
breeding. But but yeah. So, youknow, you can investigate that
more if you really wanna diveinto this wild peony collecting
(16:33):
mad person kind of thing.
Ken Johnson (16:37):
Yeah. We're looking at the the American Peony
Society website there. They havea peony registry, and they've
got 7,686 results for forcultivars that come back. So
there's a lot.
Chris Enroth (16:51):
And and we will get into towards the end of the
show, can you make your owncultivars of peonies? And, yes,
you can. Just like daylilies oriris, anything like that, you
can you can breed theseyourself.
Ken Johnson (17:03):
Should we get into the flower forms?
Chris Enroth (17:05):
Oh, yes. The ones that I have are are they're very
old fashioned. I they're notdouble flowered. But yes, Ken,
tell me about the differentflower forms because all I'm
growing is the single flowerform, which is very still very
large, beautiful. But, yeah,what you got?
Ken Johnson (17:24):
Yeah. So the the American Peony Society. So this
is coming from their website,and we can put a link in the
show notes if you wanna readthis for yourself. So they have,
what is it, six different formsof flower forms that they I
don't recognize is the rightterm, but they those are the the
standard or or six forms. Sothey've got single, Japanese,
(17:47):
anemone, bomb, semi double, andfull double.
So but the singles, these aremore like your your wild types.
You've got five petal five ormore petals. You have pollen
bearing stamens, functionalcarpals. So they have up to 15
petals that can still beclassified as singles, provided
this kind of a saucer, more ofan open type, flowers. Japanese,
(18:09):
they have stamenoids.
These are basically stamens thathave been transformed. So
they're still, like, kinda looklike singles, they're a little
more, the stamens are littlemore pedal like. And then
anemone, is similar to the tothe Japanese, but those stamens
are are larger. The stamenoidsare larger, look a little more
(18:30):
petal like. And then bomb, thestamens have become petals, on
there, and they're the samecolor, usually the same color,
as the the the true petals aswell.
And then semi double, they stillhave, promised stamens, in the
middle, but they've got more ofthose petals on the outside.
That's a little more full, alittle more, I guess, cup shaped
(18:52):
flower, than than saucer shaped.And then full double, you know,
it's it's basically nothing butpetals in there. The the stamens
are all converted into petalsand and all of that. So if you
go to the the American PeonySociety website, they've got
pictures of all of these, whichare much better than the the
crude descriptions I just gave.
Chris Enroth (19:15):
Well, I we were at a graduation party a few days
ago, and the house as we walkedin, they had a semi double
peony, which so that is the onethat still has the the,
prominent stamens, which Iremember they were yet this kind
of very bright yellow, stamenappearance right in the middle,
(19:37):
and then the petals were thisvery dark maroon red. It was
absolutely gorgeous. Maybe oneof my favorite combinations I've
seen for a while. Maybe thinkabout more about these different
flower shapes. I think I likethe semi double the best just
because you still maintain thatcenter color kind of variation
(20:06):
that might be a you know, it itcould be a complementary of some
of the petals.
But I just think it helps itstand out more. Now the full
doubles, I can understand whypeople like those. I mean,
they're wild looking. It's justa big ball of flower petals,
really. So, yeah, I the semidouble really stood out, though,
(20:26):
to me the other night.
So if I would be venturing intothe peony world, I'd probably
start there and maybe go intosome of those, like, the
Japanese flower types or anemoneflower types. How about you,
Ken? Do you have a a favorite?
Ken Johnson (20:44):
So the one we have I got from my grandparents, it's
it's either a bomb or a fulldouble.
Chris Enroth (20:48):
Mhmm.
Ken Johnson (20:50):
I think it's probably full double because
it's still got you know, thestatement sort of no pistols and
stuff are still there if youpeel back the pedals a little
bit. Yeah. I think I'm with you.Like, if, yeah, if I was picking
one, I think I would look gomore towards that. That semi
double type.
I I think it it looks becausesome of those stamens have been
(21:12):
formed into petals, but youstill have those there, they
like the the contrast, it justlooks like a this is a bigger,
bulkier looking flower than,like, the single. It's a little
more, I guess, meat to it, Iguess, for lack of a better
term. But, like, usually, whenI'm looking at beans up, I'm
usually more looking for thefragrance. Mhmm. Like, if I'm
(21:32):
only gonna have this thing for aweek or two, it better smell
pretty good.
Chris Enroth (21:37):
Yes. I I do a lot of stopping to smell the
flowers, and especially thistime of year, our roses have
started to bloom. And, we didn'tplant these roses either. They
just they were there by theprevious owner. So and they're
all kinda old fashioned.
They smell pretty good. Andthen, of course, the peonies,
I'm stopping, like, every time Iwalk by, take a whiff of that
(21:58):
because I'm like, ugh. It's onlygonna last for so long.
Ken Johnson (22:02):
Yeah. The the ones I got I got from my
grandparents, it's they areincredibly fragrant. I have no
idea what the the cultivar is.It's just the white. It's got
little pink streaks here andthere, but it's at times, it's
almost overwhelming, thefragrance they give off.
Chris Enroth (22:17):
Mhmm. So, Ken, probably the main question I get
about peonies related to andthis is related to blooms,
though I don't know if peoplerealize that it's quite related
to to blooming, is they willcall and they'll say, my my
plants, my peonies are coveredin ants. What do I need to spray
(22:37):
to get the ants off of the thepeonies? So, you know, what what
is going on here? Because I seeants on mine all the time, and
there's never any damage.
There's never any problem here.Are the ants hurting my peonies?
Ken Johnson (22:54):
Yeah. And I think the alternate to that question
is do the ants are ants requiredto help the flowers open up? I
think that's the other the otherside of that coin, that you hear
a lot. So the ants are they'rehelping the peonies, but they're
not doing anything with theflowers opening up. They're not
damaging them anyway.
So the the peonies and a lot ofother plants have extra floral
(23:15):
nectaries. So these are partssomewhere on the plant that
produce have these glands thatare gonna produce nectar. In the
case of peonies, they've gotthem on on the sepals and stuff
in the flower buds. Those arereleasing nectar. That's gonna
draw the ants in.
Ants are gonna feed on thatnectar, and ants are kind of
territorial. They're gonnadefend that food source. So if
you have any kind of pestscoming in there potentially, or
(23:36):
any other kind of insect,they're gonna chase them away,
to protect their food source.They're in a way, they're
protecting those flower buds byfeeding by the the peonies are
protecting those flower buds byproviding those ants, with the
food source. If don't have antson them, flowers are still gonna
open up, just fine.
And I think a lot of times whenwhen people are cutting them,
they've got ants on theirflowers, they're concerned. If
(23:56):
you're doing it in themarshmallow stage, just swish
them around with some water.Same thing with the flowers.
They're opened up, take the cutflower, dunk it in some water,
swish it around a little bit.Not so violently that the petals
are coming off, but just gentlyswish them around, ants will
come out, and then you can haveyour cut flowers.
And so usually, there's notgonna be enough ants on there
that even if you did bring a fewants in, it's it's not the end
(24:20):
of the world.
Chris Enroth (24:21):
Yeah. They they probably won't even survive in
your house to to figure out away out of your house. So Yes.
Ken Johnson (24:27):
They'll have no idea about Yeah.
Chris Enroth (24:30):
I did read one of the issues with those extra full
nectaries, you know, and alsothat that nectar sort of being
spread or or or on that that budas it's beginning to open. If
you do not have enough rainfall,if you have, like, a dry spring,
(24:52):
which we have had in in yearspast, the nectar can sometimes
make the petals or the sepalsstick to the petals. And so the
you might not get a completeopening of that flower bed.
That's more of an issue for alot of the cut flower growers
that are growing them in, like,a high tunnel. You know, they're
under some type of in some typeof structure, or they're not
(25:13):
getting rainfall over top of theplant washing off that that
excess nectar, sticky nectarthat might be holding those
sepals against those petals.
So that's that was the one issuethat I saw that if you just
don't have enough rainfall or,you know, might sometimes be a
good idea, spray the top ofthose flowers sometimes with a a
(25:36):
mist of water to wash some ofthat nectar off of there.
Ken Johnson (25:39):
Yes. But
Chris Enroth (25:41):
The yes. There's a but. Yes. Big but here because
there's some foliar diseaseissues when it comes to peonies
and staying excessively wet. So,yes, the but.
Ken Johnson (25:51):
Yeah. So with peonies, I think there's
probably three diseases, we mostcommonly get. Botrytis blight,
that's the one usually, we'reseeing this in the in the spring
even more of a cool wetconditions that it likes. It's
you know, if you've got youryour flower buds, they're
developing all of a sudden, theyturn kinda black and they or
(26:12):
brown and they don't open up.You're starting to get leaf
spots on the leaves.
That's more than likely thetragus. I know I saw in mine,
we've got a bunch of severalbuds that I think succumbed to
it. I don't know how becauseit's been pretty dry. Mhmm. And
then we've got peony measles,just another fungal disease, you
get the leaf spots.
(26:33):
And the botrytis blight and thepeony measles can look pretty
similar to one another, but youkinda get these reddish spots on
the leaves and the leaf blotchor the measles, like, on the
stems and stuff like that.Again, turn for kind of brownish
over time. And then we've gotpowdery mildew. So this is again
warm humid conditions that arelike some of getting these white
(26:55):
spots on leaves. And I thinkpowdery mildew is one we I think
we're seeing a little bit morecommonly or a little more
frequently
Chris Enroth (27:02):
Mhmm.
Ken Johnson (27:02):
Becoming a little more common, over the last
several years. And that could beI I think if you've got these
nice humid conditions don't havea lot of airflow through there,
that's really good, conditionsfor powdery mildew. We don't
have a lot of rain, that helpspowdery mildew as well. If we
get lot of rainfall, that washesthat stuff off. It's it's one of
the few diseases that doesn'tnecessarily like a lot of
(27:23):
moisture on the leaves.
So, you know, if we're gettinggetting drier, you've got these
really you got older plants thathave a really thick canopy and
stuff and have a lot of airflowthrough there. You maybe could
have in pretty good conditionsfor, powdery mildew.
Fortunately, with these thesediseases, though, if if you've
got healthy, well establishedplants, they're probably not
(27:44):
gonna they're gonna look ugly,but it's not really gonna affect
the the overall health of theplant too tremendously. I mean,
with botrytis, you're gonna losesome flowers, which is the
reason we're growing them. Butthe the, like, the long term
health, if you've got a healthy,well established plant, it's
it's not too big of a concernthat we're not necessarily
getting really worked up, overfor some of these diseases.
(28:06):
And you could be pruning out.And if you've got a couple of
leaves that are really badlyinfected, prune those out,
dispose of them. Make sure whenyou're doing this, it's not wet
when you're handling the plantsso you're not spreading those
pathogens. You can usefungicides. Again, if you have,
like, the Trias or something,you're doing that early in the
season, because the thefungicides aren't once those
those plant tissues areinfected, the fungicide is not
(28:29):
gonna kill off that.
That's still gonna be infected.You're bay basically trying to
prevent the spread. So once it'sthere, you're preventing that
trying to prevent that fromspreading instead of kinda
curing those infected parts.
Chris Enroth (28:44):
Mine get powdery mildew at the end of every year,
it seems like. Just towards theend of summer, they get powdery
mildew. I do nothing about it.And they come back every year
nice and healthy.
Ken Johnson (28:58):
Yeah. Anything like garden, cleaning up the the the
leaves and stuff at the end ofthe year, could help reduce that
inoculum Mhmm. As well. And Idon't do a very good job of
that, but I still get I stillget flowers. They may look a
little ragged, especiallytowards the end of the season,
but they're still coming back.
Chris Enroth (29:18):
That's right. They're tough plants. That's why
that's why they're ineverybody's yard from
grandparents or inherited insome form or fashion that you
you've you've gotten them inthat way.
Ken Johnson (29:31):
At least in the Northern US.
Chris Enroth (29:33):
Yes.
Ken Johnson (29:34):
Can't can't grow them down south. So I think a
lot of times, you know, a littletangent here. Know, a lot of
times we get zone envy. Youknow, like, oh, they can grow
this cool tropical stuff or warmwarmer stuff that requires
warmer climate down south, butcan't grow peonies, can't grow
lilacs, spring blooming bulbs.You gotta buy those new every
(29:54):
year because you don't haveenough chilling requirement for
them.
So I think, you know, sometimesin the North, we we get jealous
of some of the stuff they cangrow down south, but I think it
goes both ways a little bit too.Yes.
Chris Enroth (30:07):
Yes. This is not a Southern species. This is a, you
know, a good Midwestern andNorthern US plant. Yeah.
Ken Johnson (30:17):
They were the zone seven, eight. It's kind of the
cutoff where you don't getenough cold temperatures Yes. In
the winter for it to to bloomproperly. Plant may grow, but
you're not gonna get much, ifanything, for blooms.
Chris Enroth (30:32):
Yeah. Mhmm. Well, I guess if you have taken this
plant, like, from agrandparent's house or, you
know, if you have have a peonyand it's not where you want it.
I've heard, and I Ken and I youand I were talking like, oh,
people say you can't move thesethings. I have successfully
(30:54):
moved peonies.
You know, what what methodswould be recommended for taking
a peony from one spot in theyard and moving it to a
different or taking it from oneyard and moving it to a totally
different yard?
Ken Johnson (31:07):
Yeah. So I think this you know, they don't
necessarily like their rootsgetting disturbed a lot, so you
wanna try to when you're diggingthem, get as much of that root
ball. Mhmm. You know, I dug theones for my grandparents. I
mean, I had a massive root ball.
And I actually I don't recommenddoing this, but that survived
out of the soil in that giantroot ball in a basically a
(31:28):
garbage hand for for monthsbefore I got it in the ground.
And it was a little rough in thebeginning, but it it survived.
I'm not saying you should dothis, but I think they're a
little a little hardier than wegive them credit for Mhmm. A lot
of times. But, yeah, try not todisturb the root system.
Get as big of a root ball as youpossibly can. The it was
(31:49):
written, you know, those rootsare kinda stiff. And sometimes,
you know, if you get that soiloff and let them sit for a
little bit, they become a littlemore pliable. So you're less
prone to breaking them, if youif you can do that. I mean, I
think the big thing is, youknow, doing doing this in the
fall is gonna be the best timeand getting as much of that root
ball and trying to disturb thatas little as possible if you're
(32:11):
if you're gonna be moving theentire plant.
Mhmm. If you're gonna bedividing it, you know, then
you're you're you're cutting itup. You're trying to get, what
was it, four or five, as yourshoots coming off the sections.
So you're you're gonna becutting it up. And so there's
gonna be a little more, It getsdamaged under the plant.
So that's it may take a littlebit of time for that to recover.
(32:33):
It may may not bloom or yourfewer blooms out those first
year or two, but then as it getsrecovers and gets established,
you'll be back to the way itshould be, so to speak. Mhmm.
Chris Enroth (32:44):
You're right. They they are tough plants. We we
bought our house that we aremoved into right now. We bought
it in we moved in in October. Soif there were any peonies
around, they got hit by thefrost that had already occurred.
They were gone, or or I justdidn't even notice them. And
that's because they were growingin the lawn. Like, there were
(33:05):
several spots just you know,next spring, I saw this peony
leaves start coming up. I'mlike, well, these are just
growing in the lawn. So I thinkthe lawn care company that was
had been mowing the that lawnfor years before we had owned
that house, I think they werejust mowing them.
And I just saw them growing upin the spring, and I said, well,
(33:30):
they are in the middle of thelawn. We're gonna try to start
to establish a few, you know,beds here, sort of shape or form
more of a a space as opposed tohaving flowers growing up in the
middle of of the lawn. You know,shrubs in the middle of the
lawn. I don't want that. And soI dug them up in the spring.
We divided them. I think I got,like, five plants kind of there
(33:55):
was there a few clusters ofpeonies that grow in the lawn,
and I sort of divided them andbroke them up into five separate
different plants. I think a fewof them I think maybe two of
them didn't establish, but theother three did establish. And
even after I dug them up anddivided them, more peony foliage
kept coming up in the same spotin the lawn. And so I dig those
(34:18):
up.
And so from all of that, I haveseveral in my yard. And also,
you know, I I try to do it thebest way. Try to keep put as
keep as much soil intact aroundthe roots as I could. Every time
I mow, I I hit the divots thatI've created. And I'm like, oh,
this is gonna be a rough bumpright here.
(34:39):
I tried to fill it in with withsoil, but I I dug a big hole and
when I dug out those roots.
Ken Johnson (34:47):
And I think when when you think about it, when
the peonies are buying, most ofthose are being divided. You
know, we've got the thesenurseries that are growing these
peony plants, and that's howthey're getting propagated.
They're digging these plants,and dividing them every few
years. Forever, it's easier todivide the younger plants as
they get bigger. You know,sometimes that that center
(35:07):
starts dying out, like a lot ofother plants, you know, it
becomes more on the periphery.
So, you know, the youngerplants, that's usually what
they're dividing up and thenbuilding up their stock. And
then once they get enough, thenthen they can sell them. So it's
Mhmm. Yeah. It's in the in thetrade and the commercial level,
they're constantly getting dugand divided and and moving
(35:29):
around and stuff.
Chris Enroth (35:31):
Well, in in in reading more about peonies, I
saw there's a lot of differentways that you can propagate
them. There's people that willuse leaf cuttings, stem
cuttings, you know, and andthey'll root those in a
propagation media, and they'llthey'll grow those out. And
there's a lot of ways to dothis, and you can even grow them
(35:53):
from seeds. So you can breedyour own peonies. And it it is
kind of an an involved process.
I don't think it's any morecomplicated necessarily than any
than, you know, doing this witha daylily. But it it definitely
takes a long time. So if youwould say cross pollen with with
one male, you know, the the bitpollen from one flower, put that
(36:17):
on a female flower part of adifferent flower, cross those,
try to breed differentcharacteristics. It could take
you you know, it could be, like,four to five years before you
see your first bloomnecessarily, and it would take
maybe five to seven years beforeyou actually see that plant come
into a more mature form, youknow, lots of flowers. What will
(36:40):
the leaves really look like?
You know? What's the habit ofthis plant? Do the leaves fall
down, or do they stay upright?Are they strong stems? And so
peony breeding is an exercise inpatience.
So the the best way to do this,though, is if you are interested
in in in in peony breeding, isprobably, you know, look up
(37:04):
there's a lot of guides onlineon how to do this. The American
Peony Society has has a reallygood guide on on how to to breed
these. And but but generallyspeaking, you would take go from
one flower, and you're selectingflowers that you like or the
habit or leaves that you like.And then you you go to another
(37:26):
female plant, and you're you'rejust finding characteristics
that you like. A lot of plantbreeding starts out as just a
guessing.
And you're just you don't reallyhave necessarily a big goal in
mind, but you're just like, Ilike this. I like that. Let's
see if I can get something thatresembles both of these
characteristics in one plant. Soyou take the the male flower
anthers or the the pollen fromthose, And you would then remove
(37:51):
all of the petals and all of themale flower parts of that you're
going to be pollinating. So thethe female flower parts, those
will remain, and and you removeeverything off of there.
And then you would then, withyour finger, try to brush the
anthers onto that female, thethe ovary, the stigma there. And
(38:12):
even if it doesn't seem like theit would stick, the pollen's
pretty sticky, and it willadhere itself to there. Even if
maybe the female flower is notquite ready to receive it, the
pollen will stick. And in a fewdays, everything should line up
for both the pollen and thefemale flower parts. So and then
(38:34):
once you do that, you have tocover that flower with some type
of some type of envelope, youknow, mesh bag, anything to
prevent pollen from reachingthat flower that you don't want
to pollinate that flower.
The other thing too, so let'ssay you go to somebody's house,
(38:55):
you like their peony, and youhave to then transport that
pollen somewhere else, it wouldbe recommended that you would
store those anthers in like apaper envelope, something that
breathes. You could do it in aplastic baggie, but you have to
make sure that that pollen canthen dry to then be received by
the female flower part. So Iguess one step that I did forget
(39:18):
is a lot of times breeders willtake that pollen, they'll put it
on a piece of tinfoil, and thenthey will shine like a, you
know, a incandescent or aincandescent light on it that
kind of dries it out over thecourse of a day. And that dries
it out, but not using excessheat, and then that pollen is
(39:38):
then ready to then go on to thatfemale flower part. So there's
and then you just wait, andseeds will develop by the end of
the growing season.
You'll harvest those, and youcan plant those right away as
soon as you get those seeds, andyou can begin to germinate them.
But they will grow a root, butthey will not grow leaves
(40:00):
because they're waiting to gothrough two types of
stratification. Again, that warmstratification that gets that
root to grow, then it needs togo through winter that will then
trigger that vegetative growthto then ensue. So you're gonna
be waiting at least a yearbefore you see your first leaf
pop up. And then once you seeonce you see that you have
(40:20):
leaves in that next year, youcan then pot those up and then
they can, you know, you can growthem out and and have several
varieties that's you know,whichever you'd want.
Ken Johnson (40:32):
And then you do if you are doing your own breeding,
you'll probably end up tossingnot necessarily tossing, but
more often than not, the thewhat you're gonna get isn't
gonna be anything spectacular. Ithink it's usually kinda few and
far between where you'd havesomething that would be
worthwhile trying to topropagate out and and get more
of, at least at a commerciallevel. If your personal level
(40:54):
doesn't really matter. But
Chris Enroth (40:57):
Then I wanted to share something. So one of our
master gardeners, Sue Marshall,she had put together this
historic story about a nurseryin Macomb called Peony Dale. And
this is by, again, Germanimmigrants. They had first
settled in McDonough Countyabout, like oh, let's see. I can
(41:23):
actually find the dates here.
Sue did a lot of research onthis. They arrived around, let's
see, 1840, '18 '80. The name ofthis family was the Wettengals,
and so Charles Wettengaulimmigrated here from Germany. He
settled in near Colchester in1850 and opened a shoe store.
(41:45):
They purchased 80 acres offormer military track land, and
eventually, they owned a wholesection.
So a 60 acres, they eventuallypurchased near Colchester, which
is by Macomb in WesternIllinois. They had six children.
One of these children, his namewas Charles, and he was the one
(42:08):
who established Peony Dale in1898. He was essentially as a
child, he was just in a curiousnaturalist. He collected prairie
plants.
He would go to the woods as he'swalking back and forth to
school, and he would justcollect them and start growing
them at his farm. His parentsweren't really thrilled with
(42:31):
this hobby because it's theysaid that it it distracted from
his other schoolwork and chores,but they they let him do that.
And so at that point in time,peonies were imported quite a
bit from Holland and France, andblooms were were in high demand.
(42:51):
So peonies were, you know, backin the eighteen hundreds were a
very popular cut flower. And sonurseries started popping up
these, like, little ones allthroughout from, like, the East
Coast moving into the Midwest.
So Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin,Illinois, they were pretty big
peony growers, you know, back inthe late eighteen hundreds,
(43:12):
early '19 hundreds. And so whenCharlie, this young boy, when he
was 14, he ordered his firstpeony from France. It was 1898.
Then he started ordering plantsfrom Holland. He held a flower
show in 1910, and he made $75back then, which was a lot of
money, you know, for a youngboy.
(43:32):
And he just continued to buy andcultivate peonies. You know,
eventually, would take wagons ofcut flowers from the Comb Train
Station. He'd he'd go all theway into Chicago to sell them.
His inventory was so big. Sokinda fast forward to 1935, he
had 200,000 plants.
And by 1955, there was anarticle that wrote that
(43:56):
thousands of people would comevisit Peony Dale or Peony Dale
during the growing season. So,essentially, I you know, Sue,
she tracked down some of histheir descendants. I think
they're out in Oklahoma now,but, you know, they were really
fascinated by the story of, youknow, their their grandfather
(44:17):
and and things. And so, youknow, they're always looking for
these stories. And they foundout, you know, that they found
some old notes of of Charlie's,and he had developed 11
varieties that are registeredwith the American Peony Society,
but there's no pictures of them.
There's just his notes and hislists. And so, you know, there
(44:43):
was sort of this little movementfew years ago to try to see if
we could find any of them. Idon't think they really could.
But, yeah, we I have his listright here. And a lot it seems
like a lot of peonies are namedafter people.
Right? Like, there's the Mhmm.Sarah Bernhardt, the one of the
more popular ones, which I, forsome reason, kept thinking of
(45:05):
Sandra Bernhardt, the comedian.Like, why would they name a
peony after Sandra Bernhardt,the comedian? But it's Sarah
Bernhardt.
But, yeah, some of his varietiesare Beacon Light, one named
after him, Charles, ClaraStockwell, Georgette, Irma, the
Lucy Dunn, the white filiform,Lothario, the Margaret
(45:30):
Vereheller, Martha v Lane,Martha I a Tieman, missus w d
Bennett, missus or w l Miller,the Torridor, Sarah m
Wettengall, which I think washis mother's name. So, yeah,
those are his his 11 registeredwith the American Peony Society.
(45:54):
And it's just I think smalltowns in the Midwest have these
stories about Mhmm. Thisparticular plant. So, yeah, it's
a little trip down, a littlehistorical lane.
And so they actually have adisplay in our local museum
about Peony Dale.
Ken Johnson (46:10):
So what happened to it?
Chris Enroth (46:13):
It's it's sort of so Sue went to visit this farm,
and it just sort of has returnedback to the land, so to speak.
So, there's definitely justpeonies growing wild throughout
this 60 acres, but it's alsogrown up in trees, oaks, and
(46:36):
hickories, all these otherplants that he collected. So,
you know, Sue said it's it'sit's beautiful. It's
breathtaking. It's stunning, butnobody knows it's there.
It's hard to get to now. It'sjust this old farm that, you
know, grew thousands andthousands of different types of
(46:57):
plants, many of them peoniespeonies. And, yeah, it's just it
I would love to go visit itright now this time of year.
Ken Johnson (47:08):
Field trip.
Chris Enroth (47:09):
Let's go. We gotta find it first. Sue will give us
directions. But yeah. So, yeah,that that yes.
Little trip down looking lookingback. But I think can we other
than the ants, there's anotherbig question that we get is,
like, you know, why aren't mypeonies blooming? And we talked
(47:34):
about cold. Is is that theissue? Is they're just not
getting cold enough in thewinter?
Ken Johnson (47:39):
In the Midwest, probably not. If you're a little
further south, that that couldbe an issue. But there's
probably well, there can bemultiple reasons as to why. I
think some of more common onesis plants are planted too deep.
Those really, those eyes shouldonly be, like, an inch or two
below the ground.
They get too deep. Sometimesthey are not gonna bloom.
There's also they may be liftingthe plants up, getting too much
(48:01):
shade. The beans we have in ouryard, think that's starting to
become a little bit of an issue.They're not still producing
flowers, not quite as many aswhen we first got them in there.
Some of the trees nearby are aregetting bigger, casting more of
a shadow. So they are full sunplants. So, you know and again,
they are long lived. So you mayhave had one that you planted
thirty years ago when that treewas really small and not casting
(48:22):
a shadow on it, and now it is.So there may be time to dig that
plant and move it.
Those are probably the two mostcommon reasons. We talked about
the botrytis blight. Well, thatthat gets in there. That can
kill the flower buds. You know,if it's a newer plant and the
companies are specializing inpeonies, you're gonna get ones
(48:44):
with plenty of eyes and stuff onit.
You're getting real cheap onesfrom the garden center,
something like that that come ina bag. Those may be a little bit
smaller, so they just need mayneed time in order to get
established to get big enough toreally start putting out a lot
of flowers and stuff. So smallclumps, plants are just getting
really big and crowded. They maypotentially benefit from from
(49:07):
being split up too. And I don'tI don't think people usually
fertilize them much, but maybeif they're next to a lawn and
you're dumping a lot of nitrogenfertilizer on there, your
nitrogen is really gonna pushthat foliage growth.
A lot of times, they're theexpensive flowering. So it's
probably not all that common,but I think a potential,
especially if you've if you'refertilizing lawn quite a bit,
(49:29):
nearby. Just, I guess, some ofmore common, reasons why we may
not be be seeing flowers andstuff, on them.
Chris Enroth (49:39):
And that is why we grow them. And so, you know,
we're we're worried about theants hurting the flowers or
whether the ants are part of theflowers opening or why aren't
they blooming. And, you so I Isort of forget about my peonies
once they're done blooming.They're still there. I leave the
foliage up, but I I I sort offorget about them.
(50:00):
They they vanish into thebackground. Other plants sort of
come in and fill the play thethe the the area around there.
Ken Johnson (50:06):
And I guess not that we're talking about cold
weather, you if get a latefrost, a hard frost or something
that could nip the buds on youtoo. There's not much you can do
about that. Yeah.
Chris Enroth (50:18):
Well, that was a lot of great information about
peonies, a favorite of mine thistime of year. I absolutely love
this plant. I'm excited to goback home so I can go watch and
see what happens this today. Youknow, after the rain, they'll
they'll perk back up hopefully,open up bloom, get a good scent
of this kind of that sweetsmelling flower that many of us
(50:41):
have in our landscapes. And ifyou don't have it, you know,
there we talked about ways youcan plant them, divide them,
plant seeds if you can have thepatience to wait long enough.
Well, the Good Growing podcastproduction of University of
Illinois Extension edited thisweek by Ken Johnson. And Ken,
thanks so much for hanging outtalking about a delightful
(51:03):
spring blooming perennial.
Ken Johnson (51:06):
Yes. Thank you. I'm gonna go home and go smell some
peonies and everything will beokay for the rest of the day.
Chris Enroth (51:13):
That's right. Yes. We'll just keep the storms away
so they don't keep blowing over.
Ken Johnson (51:19):
And let's do this again next week.
Chris Enroth (51:21):
Oh, we shall do this again next week. The
horticultural hijinks shallcontinue on the Good Growing
podcast. Well, listeners, thankyou for doing what you do best,
and that is listening. Or ifyou're watching us on YouTube,
watching. And as always, keep ongrowing.
(51:47):
Well, that was a lot of greatinformation about the peonies.
Peonies? I think I might havesaid both over the course of the
show. So, yeah, that was a oh,what did I what am I talking
about? That was nope.
Alright. Sorry, we can't. Let mejust start over. It's getting
(52:08):
dark. I think it's gonna rainagain.
Take two.
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