Peony Primer: How Much Do You Know About This Pretty Perennial? [Opinion] (2024)

I’m not much of a flower gardener, but I am a big fan of peonies. Not only are they delicately pretty, but they also require a minimum of care and still reliably show off their beauty every spring around Memorial Day.

For those who don’t know a peony from a petunia, peonies grow on small bushes and offer large flowers with so many petals they give a pleasing ruffled appearance.

The dozen or so peony bushes in the lawn of our farmhouse have been there as long as I can recall — whether planted by my parents or some previous occupants, I couldn’t say.

We have two bushes with white peonies — which are usually the first to bloom — with the remainder being various shades of pink, from fairly pale to quite bright. We used to have two deep red peony plants in the back yard, but they apparently died off as the trees around them grew taller and the lawn became too shady for them.

My research on peonies showed, while we might see quite a few peonies blooming in our area this time of year, they are actually not native to the east coast.

According to Wikipedia, peonies originated in Asia, Europe and western North America. Artwork dating back to 13th century China depicts peonies, sometimes representing prosperity.

The Chinese city most famous for growing peonies is Luoyang, which is an ancient place that still holds peony exhibitions annually. I noted there are 25 or more species of peonies, not just white, pink and red in color like those I’m familiar with, but also purple and yellow varieties.

Although peonies are best known for being aesthetically pleasing, they’ve also served other purposes through the years.

Traditional Chinese, Japanese andKorean medicine has long looked to the root of a special peony for the herb Paeonia, which some believed to be useful to treat convulsions.

In China, a tea made from peony petals was considered a delicacy, while water infused with peony petals was used for drinking during the Middle Ages. Wikipedia also reports peony petals may be added to salads or drinks like punch and lemonade.

I’ve never tried eating or drinking anything peony-related, and am not recommending it. To me, the peony’s main significance has been as a feast for the eyes, both when used in a bouquets or portrayed in paintings by artists like Frenchman Auguste Renoir and Giuseppe Castiglione, an Italian Jesuit priest.

One thing I read about peonies on-line was something I wished I’d known years ago, because I had learned it the hard way.

I’ve always enjoyed having fresh flowers from our lawn in my office at work. Seasonally displaying flowers like daffodils, tulips, lilacs, peonies or tiger lilies in a vase on my book case seemed to bring the outdoors inside. They also made great conversation starters, as visitors to my office often commented on them.

Then one day, someone mentioned the ants crawling around on my book shelf. For some reason, it took years of bringing peonies to work before I connected the dots between the peonies and presence of ants.

I was eventually told peonies require ants as part of their blooming process. I wasn’t sure if that was an old wives’ tale or not, but I became much more careful about checking my peonies for ants before I cut them and brought them indoors.

It was only in doing my research for this article that I learned the true relationship between ants and peonies. It turns out ants like the nectar that forms on the flowers’ buds, which is what brings them running.

While ants are no one’s favorite insect, there seems to be an upside to their peony attraction — the ants’ presence apparently deters other insects that might be harmful to this plant.

I remember my mother cutting peonies every Memorial Day and placing them in a tall can that had formerly held pineapple grapefruit juice. With the label removed, the can was a shiny silver, which made a suitable vase.

She’d put some crushed stones in the bottom of the can for weight and take along a jar of water to be added at the cemetery.

Usually our purple “flags” — better known as irises — would be in bloom at the same time. She would add a few stems of them to the peony bouquet for a pop of color and off we’d head to the Colebrook Lutheran cemetery, where her parents and grandparents are buried.

I never liked pineapple grapefruit juice, so when I cut flowers for the cemetery these days, I use a vase made from an old pickle jar, saved specifically for this purpose.

Actually, this year my pickle jar of peonies for Memorial Day went to a cemetery in Reinholds, where Dennis’ relatives are buried. I was able to scrounge up a mayonnaise jar vase for the peonies destined for my parents’ graves.

When I delivered my peony bouquet to their cemetery, I “explained” to my mother, while the peonies were right on time, our irises had bloomed early this spring, so were unavailable for adding colorful accents.

Back home, I picked one more bunch of peonies, put them into a pretty cut glass pitcher and set them on our kitchen island as a reminder of loved ones remembered fondly.