Gardens at Coppertop

Peonies are some of my favorite flowers for their amazing beauty and sublime fragrance, and as such, I’ve written about them frequently (here, here, and here, for starters). One of peonies’ best features is how long-lived they are, surviving for decades with very little care.

Coppertop has a couple dozen peonies, ranging from herbaceous to intersectional (or Itoh) to one tree peony, allowing for a bloom period of well over a month in late spring and early summer. Part of their appeal to me is their preciousness due to their ephemerality. Oh, I do enjoy a good, hardy perennial that colorfully hangs around and faithfully blooms for months on end, but I treasure peony blooms because they are fleeting. Their limited season encourages us to indulge quickly and thoroughly! Varieties range from simple anemone styles to exuberant bomb styles, and now with the intersectional hybrids, colors range widely as well.

I’ve attended plenty of garden talks and lectures on peonies in the Pacific Northwest, and most refer to Adelman’s Peony Farm in Oregon as being a top source for tubers. I finally jumped in and ordered tubers from them about a month ago.

Fall is the very best time for planting peonies. I’d hoped to bulk up and extend their season here by filling some bare and sunny spots with new tubers. I love to think that these new peonies will outlive me, a legacy blooming for future generations. Once established correctly, peonies promise to get better year after year, and it’s important to plant peonies where they will thrive without being disturbed for many years. At least half of the new varieties will be planted with other young peonies in this large, full-sun, raised bed outside the kitchen. The bed has been prepped by the removal of many unimpressive hardy geraniums and catmint.

The box arrived a week ago, and it’s solid weightiness foretold the bounty within. Packed well in layer upon layer of peat, the tubers were enormous and healthy. All had at least five plump eyes, or growing points, and some had over 10. I unpacked them in the garage and laid them out on the nearby kayaks and deck railing to have their portraits taken 😉 .

The box contained six varieties I’d ordered: Madame Butterfly, Miss America, Morning Lilac, Sonoma Apricot, White Frost, and White Sands.

Now to get busy planting! Below I’ve included Coppertop’s updated list of peonies, Paeonia.

Variety, Quantity, Season	Type	Color	Coppertop Location
Alba Plena, 2, early-mid	lactiflora	white	SoG, CHb
Bartzella, 1, mid	Itoh	yellow	Kb
Big Ben, 1, early-mid	lactiflora	pinkish red	SoG
Black Beauty, 1-2, mid	lactiflora	deepest red	SoG, Kb
Bowl of Beauty, 1, late-mid	lactiflora	pink w yellow	Kb
Bunker Hill, 2, early-mid	lactiflora	magenta	Kb
Cora Louise, 1-2, mid	Itoh	palest pink	Kb
Duchess de Nemours, 1, mid	lactiflora	white	CHb
Festiva Maxima, 3, early	lactiflora	white	2SoG, Kb
Kinkaku, 1, early	tree	peach	patio pot
Madame Butterfly, 2, mid	lactiflora	magenta	Pb
Miss America, 1, early-mid	lactiflora	white w yellow	CHb
Morning Lilac, 1, early	Itoh	lilac	CHb
Sarah Bernhardt, 3+, late	lactiflora	pink	SoG
Sonoma Apricot, 1, mid	Itoh	apricot	Kb
White Frost, 1, mid	lactiflora	white	Kb
White Sands, 2, mid	lactiflora	white	Chb, Kb
Wladyslawa, 3, early-mid	lactiflora	br. pink w yell.	Kb
No ID (Philomele or Mdm Emile Debatene?), 2, late	lactiflora	deep pink	Kb