2021 Peony 'First Arrival' Southern Peony Best Performer - Week 4

Peony 'First Arrival'
Southern Peony Best Performer

Peony 'First Arrival'
Southern Peony Best Performer
Intersectional Peony 'First Arrival' was supposedly the first ever intersectional peony that bloomed for Roger Anderson from his intersectional peony breeding attempts. It sure is a beauty, and I don't think I've seen another intersectional peony on the market with a color quite like this one. It has a very nice pink color with a bit of a lavender tint. Intersectional Peony 'First Arrival' was hybridized by Roger Anderson and registered with the APS in 1986.


Peony 'First Arrival'
Southern Peony Best Performer

Peony 'First Arrival'
Southern Peony Best Performer
This intersectional peony will fill up the bush with buds, which bloom over a few days giving a fresh set of blooms, while the old blooms fade cleanly from the bush all on their own. This Intersectional Peony 'First Arrival' grows well here in the South. My plant took a few years to settle in, but it really seems to be taking off now. The bush gets larger and has more blooms on it each year! The blooms on this plant are quite variable in number of petals and form, but most of them have a pleasing symmetrical shape with rounded petals. The very center of these blooms have small dark pink/purple flares, giving the blooms a delightful inner glow of color!


Peony 'First Arrival'
Southern Peony Best Performer

Peony 'First Arrival'
Southern Peony Best Performer

2021 Year in Review

Wow, I can't believe it's almost Christmas already!! 1 week from today! Where has the year gone? I hope all of you are doing well. I know that this global pandemic has been hard on all of us. I hope that each of you has taken the time to take care of yourselves and find some time of peace, respite, and relaxation in your gardens. Even in the fall and winter, it is still nice to get outside, take a stroll, get some fresh air, and see what Mother Nature has been doing.

Intersectional Peony 'Keiko'
I'm not sure what the American Peony Society has been up to, but I am really hoping that I am able to join all of my peony friends again at next year's APS Convention. I recently changed jobs this year, and I am hoping for a better work/life balance in 2022. I think many people have been searching for the same thing. As the world has met the challenge of covid and all of its variants, people have reexamined what is most important to them in life.

Even though I didn't post anything the rest of this year, it doesn't mean I didn't take any peony photos in 2021. I actually have over 2,500 photos from 2021 (which is a lot less compared to 2020 - 9,250! - I might have overdone it last year! HA :-D) Anyway, I'm hoping to see what I can get put out at the tail end of 2021. I'm almost on vacation for the rest of the year, Monday will be my last working day in 2021. So I'm hoping to have some time to devote to my peony passion to round out the year.

I have some Southern Peony Best Performers I'd like to tell you about, plenty of nice "head shots" to add to my Peony Photos, and some new Color Classifications that I managed to collect! :-) And that photo above? Intersectional Peony 'Keiko' - one of my favorites!!! Can I nominate her every year for a Best Performer? So consistently beautiful! LOVE IT!!! 💗

2020 Peony Blooms Week 9 Very Very Very Late

WOW. Is there another word for Wow? This is definitely mind blowing! For the first time ever here at Southern Peony, we've had a Week 9 Bloom Season! That is probably very rare, especially for the South, where it usually goes from winter to summer in 1 week flat. LOL. I must say I am very grateful to have witnessed our slowest spring warm up ever, with the mildest, most moderate spring temperatures in memory. It almost felt like I wasn't in the South. ;-) For our 2020 Bloom Season Week 9 we have these 2 stunners that first opened and began to entertain us, Peony 'Karl Rosenfield' and Peony 'Dinner Plate'. They are both pink, but two very different colors of pink. Peony 'Karl Rosenfield' is a hot pink oldie but goodie from 1908, while Peony 'Dinner Plate' is perfectly light pink variety about 60 years newer. Both are definitely late season beauties!


Peony 'Karl Rosenfield'

Peony 'Dinner Plate'

2020 How to Make a Peony Support Ring from a Tomato Cage

Peony 'White Cap' in Dire Need of Support
Day after day, I just couldn't take looking at it this way anymore. This Peony 'White Cap' just kept blooming and blooming. I thought at some point it would just quit blooming and I wouldn't have to watch the blooms keep opening on the ground, but it just kept blooming and blooming. Even days after I went to the store to purchase a tomato cage did I finally get around to messing with this plant, and it was still blooming (granted it was almost finished, but still blooming).


Carefully Putting Tomato Cage on Peony 'White Cap'
I thought I might need to trim the bottom of this tomato cage to make it a suitable support for my Peony 'White Cap', but this peony was so tall and my tomato cage was so short, that it worked out just right! I purchased the 33-in Galvanized Steel Wire Round Tomato Cage from my local home improvement hardware store - Lowe's. This particular tomato cage came with 3 support rings on it, which did make it a little tricky to get on my plant, but I was able to finally get it on there. First I gathered up all of the stems, and put them as close together as possible so that I could fit the flowers through the bottom ring of the tomato cage, then the second ring.


Peony 'White Cap' Fully Supported
After that the foliage was kind of in the way. So I had to wiggle and jiggle the tomato cage on a bit, carefully putting each leaflet through the bottom ring of the cage. I was able to start pushing the cage into the ground a bit, adjusting the leaves up through the cage, pushing the cage down a bit, adjusting the leaves, repeating until the tomato cage is at the desired height needed to support the peony. I must say this Peony 'White Cap' does look so much better when the flowers are up higher, making them easier to see their lovely contrasting blooms and smell their fragrance!


Peony 'White Cap' The Next Day
I will also admit that this was not the most ideal time to add support for this peony. Next year I will put the support out before the foliage emerges so that it can grow into the support rings naturally (and I can help make sure that it does). The peony seemed to work great in this size tomato cage, but it looks like Lowe's also sells a short 30" version with only 2 support rings if you think that might be more to your liking. As you can see I took a photo of the plant the day after I added the support and some of the foliage had started to adjust to the correct positioning (after being on the ground so long, the foliage was also growing sideways). I also captured this gorgeous bloom photo of Peony 'White Cap' which looked like it had regained some moisture overnight.


Peony 'White Cap' Bloom

2020 Peony Blooms Week 8 Very Very Late

It looks like the "Firefly"s came out this week. It is always so neat to see the wild, twisted, and striped petals on Peony 'Raspberry Firely' and Peony 'Pink Firefly'. Peony 'Candy Stipe' is always one of the last peonies to bloom in my garden, and I always look forward to it's peppermint like stipes as well. Peony 'Cora Stubbs' presents a beautiful bi-color with perfectly pink petals and an almost white tuft in the center, so cute. Peony 'Pink Derby' also has multiple layers of color in a big, bomb shaped flower. I can't believe the peony season is drawing near to the end. This week 8 bloom period is only the 2nd time in 10 years that we've had a very very late Week 8 season. I have really enjoyed having so much time with the blooms this year. I think we may even have a record-setting Week 9 next week. :-o Stay tuned!


Peony 'Cora Stubbs'

Peony 'Raspberry Firefly'

Peony 'Pink Derby'

Peony 'Pink Firefly'

Peony 'Candy Stripe'