A Paeony Dream

Paeonia obovatum

Paeonia obovatum

Most Flora Wonder Blog readers know what I grow, basically, since the crops fall into one of three main groups: 1) maples 2) dwarf and unusual conifers and 3) everything else. The latter group consists of plants I consider beautiful or interesting, ranging from alpines to Zenobia, with Paeonia somewhere in the middle. I think that from my modest collection we propagated only P. ludlowii and P. lutea. We would gather the black elk-turd-looking seeds that fell under the bush, copying the nursery's resident squirrels that transport them to all parts in the gardens, and these seeds would readily germinate for both the squirrels and us.

Paeonia 'Joseph Rock'

My knowledge of the Paeonia genus is sparse, not that I don't find many wonderful, but because my brain has a limited capacity I was always afraid to invest my precious synapses willy-nilly. In a recent blog post, My Garden Labyrinth, April 29, 2024 is a photo of the late Reuben Hatch sniffing a Paeonia 'Joseph Rock'. The point of the photo was to illustrate Reuben's connection with my life's career, and he could just as well have been smelling a rose or a camellia, or dog shit for that matter.

A blog reader, Brian Humphrey VMH from England, was curious about the peony in particular, and I'm always interested in what the old plantsman has to say:

Dear Talon,

As always we enjoy your blogs. Julie is especially keen on etymology so your details on this for various plants etc. always pleases. Your latest on the Veitch dynasty was well up to standard. 

I am really contacting you because of your picture of Reuben Hatch holding what you say is Paeony Joseph Rock. As it happens I have been quite involved with that plant through the Notcutt propagator Ivan Dickings. 

Gansu Province in red

Sir Frederick Stern

Ivan was a very keen plantsman as well as fine propagator and I am not sure how but he made contact with the public council now running Sir Frederick Stern`s old garden near Worthing on our south coast. Stern was a great gardener with a particular interest in Paeonies I believe. He heard the story of Joseph Rock finding a paeony of outstanding merit in a lammasary in Kansu (now Gansu) in China. Obtained seed from the lammas and sent it to Arnold Arboretum. He was possibly commissioned by them to search for plant material. To cut short a long story which you may well be familiar with Stern had seed of this plant sent to him by Arnold and had the plant in his his garden – Highdown – remained there for many years. By a circuitous route Ivan managed to get scions of this plant and was largely responsible for its reintroduction into British gardens.

Paeonia 'Highdown'

Paeonia Gansu hybrid

Paeonia Gansu hybrid

Paeonia Gansu hybrid

I obtained scions from Ivan and we have several plants of `Joseph Rock` here. I have to tell you that keen plantsmen/botanists have got onto this story and have now decided that the plant coming from Highdown cannot be called Joseph Rock because it is a seedling and not vegetative material from the original at Arnold. As a result to my great regret it now has to be called Highdown. I believe/assume that Stern`s plant was very similar to the original at Arnold but I have to concede that seedlings from the plant now know as the Gansu hybrids do vary considerably. Some of them are outstanding plants in their own right and I attach a few pictures of Ivan Dicking`s seedlings we are lucky to have in the garden here. One of them a white with less pronounced purple central markings could I suppose pass as Joseph Rock.

Paeonia rockii

I have to tell you looking at the picture of Joseph Rock you posted Julie and I have doubts as to whether it is the true plant as we understand it. Paeonia rockii has been found and introduced since Rock`s original discovery I believe and include a picture of a good form of rockii for your interest. It would be interesting to know the source of Reuben`s plant or is it one of yours?

Best wishes 

Brian

My response will be directed to Mr. Humphrey and all others who read this blog:

Thank you for your comments. It's nice to know that at least two plant people find something of interest with the FW Blog. As usual you stir me with a question, but this time I'm not experienced enough to adequately answer. The Hatch photo is 15-20 years old, taken at the University of California Botanic Garden in Berkeley, California. The UC garden is at least one hundred years old and they were direct recipients of plants from George Forrest and Joseph Rock etc. but I'm not aware about the details of the peony in question. We tried to enlarge the label beneath the plant but still cannot make it out. I didn't invent the plant name but I did copy it. So, if I captioned it as Paeonia 'Joseph Rock' that's what the label said. I don't know if that name is the same, or different from Paeonia rockii. I admit that my photo doesn't show a flower quite as dramatic with purple markings as some P. rockii I have seen. I have never grown the species or any of its hybrids though, but I would if I knew where to obtain them.

Anna Pavord

I thought my response would be the end of the matter, but the very next day, as if from on high, I stumbled onto an Anna Pavord article in The Independent (US edition), from 14, October 2006, entitled A Paean to Peonies. Ms. Pavord is a well-known British horticultural writer and I have enjoyed her works in The Garden, the RHS's monthly publication, as well as her wonderful memoir Landskipping from 2016, The Tulip 1999, and The Naming of Names (The Search for Order in the World of Plants) 2005. In her article Pavord admits that, like me, she has never grown a P. rockii or any of the hybrids, but nevertheless she manages to explain the Rockian muddle to my satisfaction. Hmm…what should I do – plagiarize her article entirely or rewrite it as if I already know the salient points? In either case I would be plagiarizing, wouldn't I? I decided there is no harm/no foul for me to present her exact words, so why beat around the peony bush? Ms. Pavord writes:

A Paean to Peonies: The Chinese have been cultivating them for years. A nursery in Cheshire is mad for them. But just what's so special about the tree peony? Anna Pavord takes a fresh look

In the autumn of 1961, Dezhong Chen resigned from his job as factory accountant in the Chinese province of Gansu and took off for the hills. The government of the time had called for 'educated urban youth to go and work in the country and mountain areas to strengthen agriculture'; Dezhong Chen's idealistic plan was to return to his home town, Peace, and revitalise the barren land of this poor, drought-stricken area by sourcing and planting trees and shrubs that could survive the harsh conditions. After years of home study, and a degree in forestry, he began to put together a collection of native plants that he felt could do the job. Surprisingly – at least to those who cosset them in their English gardens – it included several kinds of tree peony.

These big woody peonies have been cultivated in China for thousands of years, as much for their medicinal uses as for their beauty – the bark from the root is highly prized in Chinese medicine. In his Peace Peony Nursery, Chen began to gather in various local types of purple-blotched mudan (as Peking has become Beijing, so moutan has shifted to mudan), and by crossing them created a whole new race of tree peonies that were tough, vigorous and versatile enough for his purpose. Painfully, through the course of 10 winters, he dug a channel 150 yards long to bring water from a spring to the drought-prone nursery where the annual rainfall is only 35cm and there are just 155 frost-free days in the year.

Nicole and Robert Pardo

Gradually these Gansu Mudan, as they are now officially called (see The Plant Finder for the 19 named varieties on sale over here), began to acquire a reputation, not only in China, but beyond. In France, Robert and Nicole Pardo began growing them at La Pivoine Bleue, their nursery at Montégut just north of the Pyrenees. In England, they have become an 'obsession' for Will McLewin of the Phedar Research and Experimental Nursery in Cheshire. It began, he says, 'with the conviction that most of what was said about Paeonia rockii and 'Rock's peony' was inaccurate, and that there were many similar or associated plants that should be better known and more widely available.'

Joseph Rock

The fabled P. rockii is named after the American plant hunter Joseph Rock, who is said to have seen this exotic tree peony with vast white flowers growing in the garden of a Buddhist monastery in Gansu province. McLewin, who with Chen has now written a definitive account of the peonies he has called the Gansu Mudan ( Peony rockii and Gansu Mudan, Wellesley Cambridge Press), tells a different story. He debunks a few myths and instead stitches together a complicated trail showing that few of the tree peonies that bear Rock's name are really the wild P. rockii and that many of the ones in cultivation have descended from ancient Chinese hybrids.

We are talking here about a shrubby peony (tree is a misnomer, as McLewin is quick to point out) with woody stems that are a permanent part of its structure. Its cousin, the herbaceous peony, dies down to the ground each autumn, producing fresh, juicy shoots in spring. The growth on a tree peony is upright and rather sparse, though a mature plant can be up to seven feet high and wide. The flowers are enormous, sometimes a foot across and the Chinese species P. rockii is thought particularly desirable because the blooms are pure white, with dramatic blackish-purple blotches at the base.

Xinglong Mountains

McLewin provides an exhaustive list showing how the wild P. rockii from the Xinglong Mountains differs from the cultivated Gansu Mudan. That the flowering period is 15 days, compared with 24 for the cultivars, is one reason why the Gansu Mudan is far more attractive to most gardeners than the wild species. The photographs which take up a large chunk of the McLewin/Chen book (150 in a total of 181 pages) are an even more potent draw.

The Chinese classify these peonies by colour - nine different shades. As a gardener, I'd say the choice is white or pink, but the variation on those two themes is immensely subtle, almost as delicate, intricate and sophisticated as a tulip's. As with the tulip, much of the drama comes from the contrast between the overall colour of the petal and the basal blotch. In some cultivars, the dark blotch bleeds through like raspberry juice into the surrounding colour of the petal. In others it is neatly confined to a series of thumbprints. Some petals are smooth-edged, others are as ruffled as a ballerina's tutu.

As well as the nine colours, the Chinese designate six forms of tree peony flower: single, lotus, rose, anemone, crown and globular. In general, going by the pictures alone, I liked the singles best, especially those such as 'Xiong Mao' (bear cat or panda in English) and 'Yu Shan Lun Jin' (which translates roughly as feather fan silk braid).

Conditions at the Chinese nursery are very much more extreme than at McLewin's Cheshire nursery where winter temperatures don't often drop below -6C and there are rarely more than 38 days of frost. Average rainfall there is 90cm, almost three times as much as Chen can expect in Gansu. The French nursery provides a third set of different conditions, a Mediterranean climate with mild winters and hot, dry summers. Although the heat and drought of summer sometimes forces the tree peonies into premature dormancy there, they emerge unchecked the following spring.

The message for gardeners, therefore, is that this race of tree peonies is quite awesomely tolerant of the worst that nature can throw at it. The ideal, says McLewin, is deep, rich, open loam that drains well and a position in sun but where air can circulate freely through the bush. But 'on the whole,' he adds comfortingly, 'any half-decent site will do'. Like herbaceous peonies, tree peonies resent being moved, but early autumn is the safest time to do it. They don't need regular pruning, though dead wood can be cut out if necessary in late spring or early summer.

I've no experience of these Gansu Mudan, but would expect the foliage to be as much of an asset as the flowers. That's certainly the case with a different Chinese tree peony in our garden, P. delavayi, which has small, deep red flowers and handsome, jagged leaves on long stalks. I learnt with this one that it pays to be patient. Ours had to be moved, to accommodate building works. Gradually, after it had been shifted to a new site, all the woody stems died back, but from the base the following year sprang five new shoots of miraculous vigour.

Paeonia delavayi var. delavayi

I think Anna Pavord's "fresh look" sums up the affair nicely, so I feel it was best to not water it down with my interpretation. Though she admits to no personal experience with P. rockii or its hybrids in her own garden, she does reveal that she's familiar with another Chinese species, Paeonia delavayi, which I have also grown. The latter was gifted to me by the same Reuben who initiated this blog. He had a couple of them in his garden so he decided to spare one for me. It was dug one winter and planted in a container at the nursery, to allow it to recover until I could put it into the landscape. I would concur with Pavord that "tree peonies" resent to be moved and my one specimen languished for a few years. It never looked as good as it did in Reuben's yard, so I felt it would probably recover best if I grounded it in real dirt, i.e. the make it or break it strategy. Pavord brags that her plant has "small, deep red flowers and handsome, jagged leaves on long stalks," and so did the specimen in Reuben's garden. But it struggled in my care with undersized, bleached-out flowers that weren't nearly as vibrant as they were before the harvest, plus I experienced plenty of dead wood and scrappy-looking foliage. The photo above is from the tree – post-harvest – and after nearly a decade from the transplant, the flowers still have not regained their deep-red color as before.

Highdown Gardens

The Hillier Manual of Trees and Shrubs (2019) includes Gansu Group under "P. delavayi (P. rockii misapplied)" and lists the close 'Highdown' which Brian Humphrey mentions. Hillier describes 'Highdown': "A name provided for the splendid, floriferous clone with flowers to 20cm across that was planted and still grows at Highdown Gardens, Sussex and has been vegetatively propagated and distributed elsewhere." The Highdown Garden explains itself in Our Story on their website: "Explore the history of a chalk pit transformed by Sir Frederick and Lady Sybil Stern into a National Plant Collection." Your Visit invites you to "Walk in the footsteps of aristocrats, gardeners, jockeys, plant hunters, politicians and even the Royal Family, from 1909 to 1967." Cousin Sir Edward David Stern declared in the 1922 Highdown visitor's book, "East to West, Highdown is best."

Paeonia delavayi var. delavayi f. lutea

Paeonia delavayi var. delavayi f. lutea

One of my horticultural hobbies is to consider what was previously known about a plant, and how that compares with today's knowledge, which importantly includes how its botanical classification might have changed. I have a paperback Hilliers Manual of Trees and Shrubs, 2^nd Edition* – which strangely is devoid of a publication date (but I assume from the early to mid 1970s) – and the early edition declares Paeonia lutea to be "A bold shrub of about 2m, possessing the foliage qualities of P. delavayi, in fact from leaf only they are difficult to tell apart." In the Hillier 9^th edition (2019), science has decided on a nomenclatural change to P. delavayi var. delavayi f. lutea. Well, that's one way you can solve something that's "difficult to tell apart." The f. lutea is a deciduous shrub from Yunnan, China where it can spread over sizable areas, and likewise in our garden it increases lateral territory as the fallen seeds continue to germinate a few inches beyond the perimeter.

*I would give anything to acquire a Hillier first edition, and all the better if it's well-worn and dog-earred with some plantsman's notes scribbled in the margins.

Paeonia ludlowii

Paeonia ludlowii

Paeonia ludlowii

Paeonia ludlowii

Paeonia ludlowii

Paeonia ludlowii

The 1970s Hillier Manual lists ludlowii as a subspecies or variety of Paeonia lutea. The manual is incomplete on that, but following ludlowii, further clarification is suggested with (Sherriff's Variety). In the 2019 edition the ludlowii has been elevated to specific rank, with a botanist D.Y. Hong involved. Maybe the name change was a reverse kow-tow from British botanists to their Chinese colleagues. In any case I prefer the ludlowii species for its larger, loftier architectural structure over the more bushy f. lutea. Hillier describes: "This splendid species, first collected by Kingdon-Ward and subsequently by Ludlow and Sherriff in SE Tibet, has large, golden yellow, saucer-shaped flowers, opening as the large and conspicuous leaves are beginning to expand. Award of Merit 1954." The P. ludlowii pops up all over our garden as nursery squirrels attempt to become horticulturists, or maybe they're just farming for their next meal.

Book of Tree Peonies by Gian Osti

About ten years ago I ordered a number of Paeonia ostii 'Phoenix White' from an Oregon seedling grower to supplement my "everything else" group of plants. Supposedly from China's Gansu and Hunan provinces, the endangered species was first described in 1992 and named after Italian peony expert Dr. Gian Lupo Osti – according to Plant Delights Nursery's website – and the "flower color ranges from white to pale pink…"

Paeonia ostii 'Phoenix White'

Overall, my purchased 'Phoenix White' expressed disappointment with various shades of insipid pink, like when my young daughter threw her new red hoodie into the wash with my white tee shirts. A few shirts…er, peonies appeared wonderfully white, to be sure, but even they cannot be considered true 'Phoenix White', at least by the laws of horticulture. I planted a couple of the puke-pinkers into the landscape at Flora Farm just to get rid of them since they couldn't be sold as named, but I feel remorse when I pass by them, knowing that some customers received fraudulent goods under my watch.

Paeonia mairei

Paeonia mairei

Paeonia mairei

In the previous Flora Wonder Blog, Pere Maire, I revealed that the specific epithet mairei had nothing at all to do with the Veitch Nursery plant-hunter Charles Maries, but rather honored another plant hunter, the French missionary Edouard Ernest Maire. The above photos are from the Rhododendron Species Botanic Garden in Washington state, as the rare species was collected in 1995 by Garden Director Steve Hootman from southwest Sichuan, China. P. mairei is said to be one of the first to flower in spring, and that the blooms are able to withstand some frost. I won't attempt to acquire it because 1) I don't own a nursery or arboretum any more and 2) I'm not particularly fond of the pink-purple blossom color. I suppose it's the history that intrigues me more than does the plant itself.

Personally I don't care for most peonies on the market; they're a bit too gaudy for my taste, where I find the simple species to be more attractive than the hopped-up commercial fare. I feel the same about rhododendrons, roses and other plant genera, as they can become "too" beautiful when nurserymen are involved. About five years ago I visited an Oregon peony nursery, and while I admired a few of their cultivars, many others just appeared over-bred to me. The following are some that I would never want in my garden, especially with their goofy names:

Paeonia 'Angel Cheeks'

Paeonia 'Cherry Ruffles'

Paeonia 'Christmas Velvet'

Paeonia 'Cream Puff'

Paeonia 'Golly'

Paeonia 'Red Grace'

Paeonia 'Shirley Temple'

This blog was accidental in a sense, as I'm the first to admit that I know very little about the genus. I did know that Paeonia is from Greek paionia, from Paion, Paeon, the physician of the gods, its reputed discoverer. I know that it is used in China for medicinal purposes, but then what plant isn't?