Paeonia suffruticosa ‘Hanakisoi’

In our former garden there grew the most lovely tree peony, Paeonia suffruticosa ‘Hanakisoi’ which was planted many years ago by the previous owner and grew to be quite large. I had never tended a tree peony before so it was a really fun learning experience and here’s what I discovered: First off, they’re super easy to cultivate which came as a bit of a surprise. Ours was planted in the shade of the house on the north side; It received only a few hours of direct sun each day. We mulched with a layer of pea gravel when we moved in which kept the soil cool and free of weeds and we didn’t do any feeding besides the occasional chicken poop from our roaming hens. (That being said, our soil in central PA is naturally pretty rich and damp.) After flowering, I left the seed heads to feed the birds during winter–the cardinals in particular loved the seeds–and then just before spring I’d snip those seed heads down to the nearest bud. One spring, we got a late, heavy snow which snapped off a large limb clean off. Following that experience, we began to support the large canes at the base with wood supports. And that’s it! So easy and so much reward. For more tree peony goodness, see this older post HERE.