The Many Faces of Coral Sunset

Now that Lemon Chiffon is finished blooming, my new favorite is Coral Sunset.  This flower starts out a lovely coral and then fades to a gorgeous yellow with hints of coral on the bottom side.  Next year when the plant is more established it will have some of the yellow and coral flowers on the same plant.  It is place perfectly transitioning between the coral and yellow beds.  It currently sits beside Garden Treasure which is also in bloom.  Coral Sunset is new to the garden this year and is doing very well.

 

Garden Treasure is new to the garden in the yellow bed. This flower I first saw at the Oshawa Botanical gardens and fell in love with the colour and shape. 

It is competing with Viking Full Moon.  Viking Full Moon is a second year plant and is much more established with lots of blooms on it.  It is an Itoh. As much as this is a lovely plant it is sitting beside Bartzella.  Since I am a big fan of double flowers I am easily distracted.  Bartzella is also a second year plant and has lots of blooms on it this year.

Bartzella

Raspberry Sundae looks good enough to eat this year.  The pink on the yellow base cupped in pink again. In the background you can see Prairie Moon still blooming.  The yellow garden from last year is really coming together. It however is not competition to the pink garden.  The pink garden is full of plants I have had for a long time.

 

Finally Some Warm Weather

The rain stop for a few hours today and the sun came out.  This was great for the peonies.

This is Sunny Girl.  This flower stayed as a bud for more than a week. Today it finally opened.  Along with many other flowers.

 

The sun brought out Coral Magic

Coral Sunset

 

Coral Charm
 



Shirley Temple

Top Brass

 



Celebrity

Prairie Moon

 

 

Felix Crousse

 

If it stays warm for a few days the entire beds will be in bloom at once.  The unknown pink from my Aunt's house is blooming too.

Along with the pink flower that came from the house that I was born in.

The plants that have been in the bed for two years now are looking very good.  There are still two plants that will not bloom again this year, but the plants are very healthy.  I can always hope that they will bloom next year. In the next few days there should be lots more that will open.  There are many empty spaces along the sides that will need plants. Most of the empty places are already ordered for fall delivery.

 Now that the plants are bigger, I do not like the one Coral Charm in the yellow bed.  I will need to move it to the side border that is all coral flowers and wait a year, than add another yellow in the yellow bed.  I think it will look much better.

Stop bye in the next couple of days, there should be pictures of several other varieties that are in bloom. 

 

 

 

Oshawa Peony Festival

I only had two peonies to enter in the show.  One was the Red Charm, that was full of water from the rain the day before, and the second was Lemon Chiffon, that had already been blooming for three days in the garden.  The one Lemon Chiffon I had ear marked to bring to the show was bigger, but had been blooming for over a week. It had past it's prime.

 This was the first year I had ever brought a flower to the show and I won Best In Show.   I did not realize at first, that this was the highest award you could get!  I was just overwhelmed with the wonderful people that I met.  It was such an honor to meet the fellow gardeners. I had read about the start of the garden on the internet, but it was special hearing the story from the people that made it happen.  I hope to make more of a contribution to the Canadian Peony Society in the coming years. 

Hear I am with Judi Denny.  She met me early Friday morning and helped me fill out the forms.  She shook out more of the water from Red Charm to help the flower show better.  Judi has a wealth of knowledge about the peonies and more importantly the people that are in the industry.  Later in the day she greeted me at the door and introduced me to many more people at the show.  She told me the story of winning the Best In Show and that she had no way of contacting me, since I did not leave a number or an address.  After I left the flowers in the morning, I went home to do some transplanting and weeding.  I went back to buy some more peonies with my daughter, and to see how I did.  You can just image the looks on both of our faces. 

The community of gardens, and the passion for some of the flowers is heart warming.  The Internet is making more people get together that share a common interest.  I have emailed or spoken to growers across Canada, in the US and as far away as Holland.  One of my pictures of Coral Charm is featured on the Swedish Peony Society and can be seen currently on their website.  It really is a small world after all.

Congratulations to all of the people the won ribbons in the show, and thank you to everyone that contributed to make this show possible.

Lemon Chiffon

This peony is new this year.  It is early, it has a wonderful fragrance, gorgeous flower, green foilage. Everthing you could want from a double flower, and it is a rare yellow.  This new plant has side flowers for a longer blooming time.  I think it has become my new favorite plant.

This has been a strange spring.  It was warm for a short while, but mostly it is cold and raining.  This is the only peony blooming in the garden.  Sunny girl has been sitting there half open for more than a week.  Red Charm is not opened, but has colour in the bud for over a week.  The pedals have fallen from all of  the other peonies that have previously bloomed.  I do not have much to bring to the Oshawa peony festival.  Once the weather warms up there should be lots of peonies blooming.  I think that we are about a week behind.

Thanks for stopping by.

Nova

Nova was noted in the disappointments from last year.  It started out very strong with five blossoms, but all of the blossoms died.  It was in such a bad shape that I did not think that it would even survive.  I had already started to think about what I would replace the plant with.  Surprise! Nova lived and is looking very healthy with two flowers on it.  It is a pale yellow.  It is an early bloomer.  The flowers this year are smaller than any other peony flower that is blooming now.  The plant is low to the ground, but I have seen healthy plants that are much taller.  I am glad the plant survived, and expect it to continue to get bigger and better as time goes by.

So in the garden there is Chocolate Soldier, Adrienne, Nova, Athena, Red tree, all blooming.  Ezra Pound has already lost all of the pedals.  Coming soon is Red Charm, Coral Charm, and Sunny Girl.

Athena

This plant did not bloom last year.  It put all of the energy into the roots to give the spectacular show this year.  The flowers are large with pink highlights in the middle.  The scent is musk. 

It is an early bloomer.  The garden is starting to fill in.  There are so many flowers to see this year.

Red Tree Peony 2013

This red tree peony looks like a rose when it first starts to open.  It's scent is as sweet as a rose too.  To me it looks nicer than a rose, when it is fully open.  The flowers are larger, the center is more interesting than a rose.

It takes much less care than a rose.  This year I have lots of seedling from it too.  It will be several years before I can see the flowers blooming.

Last year all of the flowers opened at the same time.  This year, it is staggered so the blossoms will last longer.  The camera did not capture the lovely red in this plant.  There are a variety of colours available in a tree peony. The flowers are large and very attractive.

I have not been able to identify this plant.  The tag that came with the flower only says Red Tree Botan.  The tag was printed in Japan.  If anyone knows the name it would be much appreciated.