Congratulations! Why you like Daphnis tree peonies so much?

Had to go to their site to see what you were talking about, Peonyman! They are absolutely beautiful. How big do the flowers get? The write-up says they're enormous.

Hi, LizinElizabeth, It is said the flowers of Zephyrus can be 10 inches.

Solaris Farms also has great Tree Peony listings, Khlems plants have done well for me too.

I planted some tree peonies last year and would like to put out a few more, but I am worried about the two I got from Song Sparrow last year. They survived the growing season just fine. I mulched the ground with straw for the winter just like I do for the others and all my roses. I was out looking in the yard yesterday to see what kind of condition the plants were in. The suffruticosa-derived plants appear to be okay, but the lutea ones I got from Song Sparrow do not look okay. Do the luteas remain dormant longer? The suffruticosas seem to want to wake up at the first sign of warm weather. If it makes any difference, the two lutea varieties are Prometheus and Right Royal. I also have the beautiful Hephestos on order for this spring, and I wonder if I am doing something wrong. Anyone know anything about the luteas and first winter survival rates? I have had problems in the past with first winter survival with trees before, but I wonder if I am missing something.

If you have well drain soil, you need not worried. They will leaf out when they are ready. You will definitely see growths around early April at the latest. The only thing that can kill tree peonies is waterlog and roots become rotted in your zone or very rarely animal damage. They are very hardy up to zone 4. If you do not see growths by May, then you can worry. But for now, just be patient.

Lutea hybrids are the latest of the tree peonies to bloom and the latest to leaf out but they don't leaf out that much later than the suffructicosas. I do hope they come on out and bloom for you.

I have not had any problems with survival of any tree peonies during the winter following their first year.

I have been looking at all my tree peonies, and they look awful. Buds are dried up, and the only sign of much life is down low on the ground. I have been in this place 48 years and they have never looked this bad.

Can I ask what zone are you in flowergirlks? Although my tree peony stems looks brown and lifeless right now, the buds are still green in the center if you peel the layers.
This tree peony looks like it is dead. When I checked the buds, the bud center is green.

A close up of this peony

As you can see from the outer layers, they are all brown.

I'm on the border of 5/6.I have picked a bud or 2 and they are dead. I do have new shoots coming from the bottom. Your plant looks much better than mine. We had artic weather here for about a week. I feel like thats when it happened. Most of my peonies are at least 40 years old.

So sorry to hear that. That is a terrible loss as your trees must be huge. Now they have to start all over again. I hope they will make quick comeback for you.

Can you tell me how cold the temps were that got your peony trees buds damaged and killed?

I wish I could remember better, I do know that one week it was so cold, temps and wind chill, that I didn't go out of the house except to feed birds and get the paper. Several days zero and below, and lots of low teens. We only had snow cover on the gardens twice, and then the temps were not that extreme.

Frankly, I think the wind chills probably were the culprits that finally got the buds. I can't tell you how sickening it is to look at the tree peonies.

Damage to tree peony buds is more dependant on bud development than on temperature. The more developed buds are the more susceptible to damage frome extreme cold. I am also seeing a lot of damage to my tree peonies. I am wondering if a large part of my problem might be dry conditions. We have not had much rain or snow through the winter but the ground has not been extremely dry. We have had a lot of drying winds. i suspect that the damage could be a combination of these factors.

I think it was the winds here, as my yard was not that dry. The roses have suffered also, black canes to the ground, but a lot of new shoots coming from down low. I quit mounding up the roses years ago, as they seemed to do as well without. A lot of old timers here(and I am one), have said this was the coldest winter here they could remember.

I went outside and looked at my trees again today. The Right Royal still is not showing anything yet, but the Prometheus is showing life at ground level so that is encouraging. All the others are in some stage of trying to leaf out. While that looks hopeful, the weather forecast is not hopeful because today the temperature is somewhere in the 80s, but this weekend it is supposed to go down to 26 unless that gets changed. I will probably have to cover my trees with buckets or extra leaves or something. My roses are going to get clobbered again, like usual. We also could use rain, but not much of that is in the offing either.

How could the plants know what to do with this crazy weather? Yesterday 92 at 3:00. this morning 32. and the wind blew a gale all night. I'm starting to water a little here and there as the bulb stems are way too short. I just hate to see tulips with such short stems.

Wow, that is the widest range of temp that happens in less than 24 hours that I have ever heard. That is so crazy! I hope the range will get alot narrower as the days progress.

Not nearly as crazy as it was in the early 90's, when the temp fell 80 degrees in one day in early Oct. The sap was still up and the trunks froze, you could hear them crack like a rifle shot all over town. Flying over town the next spring was like a war zone. They estimated about a third of our trees died.