Plant care
Peonies will not take root without timely feeding, watering and other processing.
Watering and feeding
For each bush, a bucket of well or settled water is consumed. During drought, the frequency of watering is 1-2 times every 7 days, in normal weather - once every 1.5-2 weeks. The main thing is not to allow the soil to completely dry out.
Top dressing is carried out immediately after planting, then in the season before flowering.
Mulching and loosening
This will help retain moisture and feed the bush. Mulching begins in spring. Best after loosening. Used as mulch:
- sawdust;
- peat;
- humus;
- fallen leaves.
Additional Information! To avoid fungal infections, the mulch is laid in a layer of 0.5-1 cm.Using loosening, it will be possible to remove unnecessary weeds, fill the root system with oxygen.
Preventive treatment
Carried out before landing. Saplings are processed with potassium permanganate, the cuts are covered with coal or covered with brilliant green. It is advisable to treat the root zone with Bordeaux liquid. During growth and development, it is worth spraying the bushes with solutions from pests and diseases.
Soaking the seedling before planting it in the ground
Reproduction of peonies
There is a vegetative way of reproduction of peonies - division of adult plants, cuttings using rhizome segments and generative - growing flower from seed.
Seed propagation takes quite a long period of time and requires patience. A similar breeding method is used to breed new varieties of flowers. It is not worth growing a peony from seeds in the garden - the plants obtained in this way will not inherit the varietal attractiveness of the parent bushes.
Growing from seeds
For a similar breeding method, you can use your own collected seeds.
In order to obtain high-quality planting material, the seed pods are allowed to fully mature directly on the plants. The walls of such multileafs will become thin and brownish, and the seeds inside will become glossy and dark brown.
Sowing seeds is carried out immediately after ripening and collection - in August, on a previously dug area. The seeding depth is 1 - 2 cm. The crops are watered, and in the autumn months they are covered with non-woven material until the first serious frosts.
In early spring, the first shoots will appear in this place. In order to see the first flowering of peonies grown from seeds, you should be patient - it will come only at the age of 4 - 5 years.
Division of bushes
Herbaceous peonies reproduce easily by division. Plants aged 5 - 6 years old, which have already bloomed for 1 or 2 seasons, are suitable for such reproduction. The bushes are dug out at the end of August - September, lightly shaken off the rest of the soil.
The rhizomes are examined for dead or rotted areas. Rotten and old roots are cut to healthy tissue with a sharp pruner or garden knife. The wounds resulting from such pruning are treated with charcoal powder or ash - this will help dry and disinfect such places.
Divide the rhizomes into several parts, so that in each part there are several strong roots with growth buds (in each division there are 3 - 4 buds). Since mature bushes have a fairly dense middle, they can be separated using a wedge, which is driven into the center of the plants with a hammer.
Do not make too large or too small divisions - the former can hardly tolerate a transplant and adapt for a long time in a new place, and the latter often die.Delenki before planting should be treated with a clay mash with an admixture of copper sulfate and wood ash 0 such treatment will protect the roots from pathogenic microbes that live in the soil. Then the plants are planted in the garden and watered.
Reproduction by segments of rhizomes
Not all plants can reproduce in this way - mainly medicinal peony and American plants reproduce with cuttings of roots. When transplanting, the root system is cleaned of the earth and washed. The rhizomes are examined and thick cuttings are cut off, on each of which there should be a bud of renewal. In length, such segments can reach 8 - 10 cm.
The cuttings are sprinkled with charcoal at the ends and planted in the ground, and then watered. In the spring of next year, such cuttings will allow young plants to form only 1 - 2 leaves, in the second year their number will increase, and the first buds will appear only in 4 - 5 years.
Milk-flowered varieties care
Peonies are those plants that can be planted in the garden without worrying about caring for them. But there are times when the bushes still need supervision.
Watering and feeding
It is watered only in dry summers, when the air temperature rises daily to +30 and above degrees Celsius. Warm, settled water is suitable for irrigation. Watering rules are as follows:
- At a distance of 25-40 cm from the center of the bush, a deep groove is made in a circle.
- Water is poured into it, they wait until it is absorbed, the groove is filled up (during heavy rain, excess moisture can accumulate in it).
Watering frequency - once a week, in the evenings, after sunset. Peonies need moisture constantly, but especially at the end of May during the formation of ovaries and in August when the buds of renewal are laid.
Fertilize the bushes with liquid fertilizers for flowering, in the spring you can feed them with humus or ammonium nitrate. There can be 4 such dressings in total, including potash fertilizers and superphosphates.
Single landing
Mulching and loosening
The soil under the bushes is loosened after the next watering or rain. This is necessary to supply oxygen to the roots. Deepen no more than 5 cm under the bush and 10 cm around it. Mulch the soil with humus immediately after applying top dressing or at any other time, but not often, 2-3 times per season.
Preventive treatment
Peonies do not get sick often, but if the summers are wet and cold or humid and very warm, then you should expect the appearance of gray rot or rust. For preventive purposes, plants are treated with fungicides. A specific substance can be recommended in a flower shop, but most often flower growers use Topaz or Vectra, treating plants with them once every 7 days.
Peony Milk-flowered (Paeonia Lactiflora) - what kind of peonies it is, the history of creation
Milk-flowered peonies are quite hardy, rarely get sick, look spectacular in the garden and in a bouquet.
Brief description, characteristic
Milk-flowered peony can be distinguished from other plants of this family by its compliance with the following parameters:
- roots of a brown shade, spindle-shaped;
- the stem is bare, reaches a height of 1 m, ends with 1-2 flowers;
- leaf plates have a lanceolate or elliptical shape, the tips are sharp, can be leaf-shaped or whole. Painted light green;
- the flowers are large, with a diameter of 8 to 16 cm. The buds are colored burgundy, red or pink. Regardless of the color, the stamens are always yellow.
Milk-flowered variety
It blooms annually, for almost a whole month, becoming a decoration of the garden.
Advantages and disadvantages of the view
There are more advantages to growing this variety of peony than disadvantages. The only drawback is the fragility of the stems. With a heavy downpour, they are bent to the ground, without assistance they cannot take a natural vertical position. The obvious advantages of cultivating lactic-flowered peonies (paeonia lactiflora) in the garden include:
- long growing period in one place (40-50 years);
- frost resistance (withstand temperatures down to - 40 degrees Celsius);
- immunity to most fungal diseases and pests.
Tree variety
Important! The peony withstands severe drought, does not die in frosts, even if they began after the appearance of young shoots
Use in landscape design
Landscape designers use peonies to decorate flower beds and garden plots. The bush is easy to shape the way you want. By planting several shades of plants next to it, you can create a wonderful composition. Peonies go well with other flowers. The leaves of the faded plant also fit harmoniously into the surrounding landscape.
