Second Tree Peony

My first tree peony ever began to bloom last week. Now my second one has opened its dark red buds!

Tree peony 'Wu Jin Yao Hui'

 Its name is 'Wu Jin Yao Hui', which means something like "Glittering Black Gold" in Chinese.  I can't seem to capture the color accurately with my camera - it is a deeper wine-color in reality. The flowers have a sweet fragrance, but the scent is not nearly as strong as my white one, 'Xiang Yu'. (In peonies as in roses, stronger pigmentation tends to correlate with fainter fragrance.)

Tree peony 'Wu Jin Yao Hui' - 6-year old plant

This is a 6-year old, which is still just a young'un for a tree peony. When it is older, the plant will of course be larger and have more flowers, but also the flower size should increase, and each flower should have more petals. Tree peonies sometimes have very differently shaped juvenile and adult flowers.

Tree peony 'Wu Jin Yao Hui' - bud opening

Naturally, as soon as the flowers started opening it began pouring down rain. Hopefully we will have some cool dry weather now so these flowers will linger for a few days... but we all know that peonies are a fleeting joy.

Tree peony 'Wu Jin Yao Hui'

Early May Views

Here are some views of my garden in early May:

Front Entry Border - This small wedge between the front walk and house is sunny, hot, and dry. At the moment it's got allium, catmint, purple sedum, dwarf spruce, thyme, dianthus, lysimachia, and geranium sanguineum in it. I'd like to add something taller to give it more height at some point (a climbing rose perhaps?), and need more bushy things to hide dying tulip and allium foliage.

Allium 'Globemaster', Nepeta 'Dropmore Hybrid', Picea abies

Side Shady Border - This long narrow strip under the eaves in my side yard is dry and shady. It is currently home to bleeding heart, bergenia, ferns, hellebores, polygonatum, a dwarf oakleaf hydrangea, canadian ginger, heucherella, heuchera, and astilbe. (The astilbe needs to be moved to a moister spot - last year it shriveled up and I thought it was a goner for sure!) There are also daffodil and hyacinth bulbs. I need to add more height here as well - I may try to persuade a euonymous to climb a small trellis, and perhaps add some wood spurge. (By the way, all of those rocks were dug out by me when preparing the beds!)

Blooming: Narcissus 'Thalia', Bergenia cordifolia 'Winterglow', Dicentra spectabilis

Back Patio Border - There is a raised bed around the patio lined with large stones. (I didn't dig these out though - they were already there, whew!) This area gets a bit of sun and has average moisture. It has columbine, phlox subulata, heuchera, some garish yellow hosta, lamium, astilbe, sedum, tradescantia, and stokesia. There are still lots of gaps here because this is one of the rabbits' (many) favorite snacking posts. There are small shrubs at the back which will hopefully one day be visible above the hosta!

Blooming: Aquilegia, phlox subulata

 The weeds growing in and under the rocks here drive me bonkers - impossible to pull, and almost no "real" plants will grow there. Have had a bit of success getting some thyme to establish, but it's still mostly weeds.

Aquilegia, Phlox subulata, Hosta, Lamium 'Orchid Frost'

Veggie Garden - Here is my veggie garden in early May: arugula, spinach, radishes, peas, broccoli, and lettuces are maturing, while a variety of Asian greens are just coming up. Tomatoes are growing away happily in their Kozy Coats. Snails are of course eating my beets - sigh. We had very cold weather and slow growth in April, but I'm hoping things will start popping in May!

Veggie Garden early May 2012

Emerging senposai, bok choi, mustard greens

First Tree Peony!

My first ever tree peony has bloomed! I'm very excited - they are my favorite plant. Here it is just beginning to open...

Tree peony 'Xiang Yu' beginning to open

I planted three tree peonies last fall. This one is only a two year old plant - actually quite surprising that it would bloom at this young age. (Often tree peonies don't bloom until they are 5-7 years old!)  There were three buds of which two have opened so far:

Tree peony 'Xiang Yu' flowering (2 year old plant)

This is a Chinese tree peony called 'Xiang Yu', which means "Fragrant Jade." It is indeed very fragrant - a dense, sweet, and slightly musky scent. Most Japanese tree peonies have had the fragrance bred right out of them. One thing I like about the Chinese varieties is that they have a wide variety of different scents: sweet, spicy, musky, or fruity.

Tree peony 'Xiang Yu'

Supposedly, this cultivar blooms as a semi-double with unstable flower form when young, then produces consistently double blooms when mature. Mine is still very small and young. I actually love seeing the bright red interior of the flower, so I'm rather enjoying this juvenile semi-double stage.

I have two more tree peonies - one is a six-year old dark red that has nine buds on it this year. Can't wait for it to bloom! The third one, a two-year old like 'Xiang Yu', will not bloom this year, which is sad but of course perfectly normal. It is growing vigorously, and is a much larger plant than 'Xiang Yu' already.