Peonies blooms fill a garden with beauty and fragrance, making it appear precious and worth viewing. These beautiful flowers make fine sentinels lining the walkway or low-height lovely hedges around the garden.
After blooming, the peony’s bushy clumps of glossy green leaves last through the summer, but they will turn golden or purple-red when fall approaches.
If you are a flower enthusiast in Colorado but you are yet to add peonies to your variety of perennials, then you need to learn how and when to grow them. Read on to gain some knowledge on planting peonies.
Can peonies grow in Colorado?
Peonies are excellent cut flowers and low-maintenance perennials that can live for several decades. They do well in almost all states, including the arid areas of Colorado, where other perennials and annuals might not even sprout.
These showy perennials enjoy taking their pen time to grow and bloom; you may not easily predict when they will sprout or bloom after planting. In some cases, gardeners have to wait for about five years to see the first few blooms.
Peonies were named after a god of Colorado; thus, it is no surprise that they grow well in Colorado. These perennials thrive well in Colorado gardens up to 7,000 feet since they require cold winters but are drought tolerant once they get established. They need most of their moisture supply in spring.
Colorado lies in hardiness zones 3 to 7, with the best climate conditions for growing peonies.
Peonies have a number of varieties that bloom in several mixed colors. If you wish to intercrop peonies, you can choose among the flowers that bloom together and make a good color rhyme.
Such flowers include baptisias, columbine, veronicas, irises, and roses.
Here are some of the varieties of peonies that you can plant in Colorado flower gardens.
- Topeka Garnet
- Scarlet O’Hara
- Nice gal
- Festiva Maxima
- Early scout
- Firelight
- Karl Rosenfield
- Elsa sass
When to plant peonies in Colorado
Like most perennials, timing is a critical aspect of planting. Planting at the wrong time might lead to poor spouting, unhealthy plants, late, early, or no blooms.
Peonies require minimal maintenance activities when planted appropriately and at the right time. Apart from timing when to plant, peonies require adequate time to establish themselves and form enough roots.
Before planting, prepare the site adequately because these plants do not respond well to transplanting.
The best time to plant peonies is in the fall, most likely in late September through October for Colorado residents in zone 3 to 6. If you are in zone 7, the planting time can extend to late fall.
If you wish to move a mature peony plant, then fall is the best time, mostly when the plant is dormant. Make sure that peonies are settled in place about six weeks before the ground completely freezes.
For the high-risk takers, you can plant these beauties in spring, though be sure that they won’t do well.
In most cases, they derail one year behind those planted in fall as the spring plants will have to wait to undergo cold hardship preparations as they await to bloom strongly when the sun shines its rays again to the ground in the next spring and summer.
Tips on How to Plant Peonies
For robust and healthy peonies, consider the following planting tips:
- Buy bare root peony tubers with 3 to 5 buds.
- Space them at 3 or 4 feet apart to allow adequate air circulation between the plants.
- Dig holes of about 2 feet deep and 2 feet wide in well-drained soil at a sunny spot.
- Add organic matter to the planting hole to enrich the soil with more nutrients.
- For clay or sandy soils, add extra manure or compost to improve the soil drainage.
- Do not plant too deep; just set the roots with eyes facing upwards in a prepared hole and make sure the roots are just about 2 inches below the soil surface.
- Carefully backfill the hole while ensuring that the soil doesn’t settle and bury the roots too deep.
- Tamp the soil slowly without applying too much force to avoid damaging the delicate roots and buds
- Thoroughly water the peonies at the planting time to give them favorable growing conditions.
Do peonies grow in Colorado: Conclusion
Knowing when to plant, how to plant, and where to plant peonies are the major determinants of a successful peony gardener.
If you wish to start planting peonies or incorporate them in your flower garden in Colorado, this article can help you as you seek to know the right planting time and much more about peony gardening.