Spring Plant Sale Preview: Peonies

'Felix Crouse' peony

By Katherine Hale

It wouldn’t be a Spring Plant Sale here at Duke Gardens without a wide variety of peonies available for your gardening pleasure. Depending on the weather and cultivar in question, these showy standouts bloom anytime between Mother’s Day and Memorial Day, offering an excellent way to honor those special people in your life.

Beloved by Chinese scholars and French Impressionists alike, peonies have a pedigree that spans over a thousand years of cultivation and appreciation, and they add character and class to every garden. In addition to old favorites like 'Sarah Bernhardt’, this year we’ll be offering another classic selection, ‘Felix Crouse’.

Known in the trade as a bomb-type double, ‘Felix Crouse’ blooms are a massive explosion of raspberry red petals with a silky texture and pleasant fragrance. First exhibited in France in 1881, ‘Felix Crouse’ is a top of the line selection that can live for up to 50 years, and it only improves with age. A bouquet of these beauties can last over a week if flowers are cut in the bud, or you can leave them on the plant to dazzle humans and butterflies alike, while pesky rabbits and deer keep their distance.

Like all peonies, ‘Felix Crouse’ will never need dividing, and it responds poorly to transplanting, so proper siting is critical for its longevity and success. Rich, well-drained soils in full sun or light afternoon shade are best, and keep it away from trees and shrubs that will compete with it for water and nutrients. Large, heavy blooms may require staking to remain upright, particularly in heavy rains. Aside from these details, ‘Felix Crouse’ is trouble-free, and equally at home in an informal hedge, the back of a perennial border, or as a beloved specimen plant.

Our peony lineup also includes ‘Bartzella’, ‘Bowl of Beauty’, ‘Festiva Maxima’ and ‘Red Magic’, and possibly a few additional surprises.  Come out and see for yourself which ones strike your fancy—with thousands of alluring cultivars commercially available, you never know what might turn up!

Photo courtesy of thesitegardener.com.


SPRING PLANT SALE DETAILS:
Date: Saturday, March 30, 2019
Time: 8 a.m.-noon
Members-only preview sale:  4-6 p.m. Friday, March 29
Member benefits: Duke Gardens members get 10% off all purchases, plus access to the members-only preview sale and a full list of plants in advance! Join online or on site.
Parking: Free during the sale.
Pets not permitted. Please see Duke Gardens' pets policy here.
Wagons + boxes: Our supply is limited; please bring your own if possible, and you'll have more time to spend gathering beautiful plants.
Your support helps Duke Gardens to provide summer internships to aspiring horticulturists from across the nation. Thank you!
Please see our event page for more information, and we'd love for you to spread the word by sharing our Facebook event page and inviting your Facebook friends.