I haven't ordered from those companies; however, if you do a web search, you will find a lot of reviews for them.

I ordered once from directgardening.com, wouldn't try it again. If you try them make sure you remove the shipping label from the package when it comes and keep it and the packing receipt, they don't replace anything without the shipping label and a lot of my order needed to be replaced.

I called again and got a supervisor this time....he claimed all the tree peonies are out of stock, with significant back orders on some. I don't understand why they don't update their site, or why they list it in their most current catalog (which was just delivered last week) if they don't have ANY. It just seems strange.

Will you be willing to try to plant peonies trees from seeds? If you do, Cricket Hill Nursery in CT offer Rockii Tree peonies seeds in lots of 20 seeds for $8.

Kousa, have you planted them from seed before? I'm going to gather any seed that looks viable from my plants in the next couple of weeks, most are still green and aren't ready. Planned to put them in the fridge in plastic bags to see if anything happens. I have plenty of room to do experiments--around 4 acres of open fields and since the deer don't bother the peonies...

I probably will order seeds in the future, I ended up with around 70 bareroots coming in Sept and have 40 daylily divisions in the garage to be planted, think I'm at my limit for this fall! Plus I still have a couple of Saunder's peonies that I need to move; per your info think I have them in too damp of a spot....

Hi Liz. No, I have never grown peonies from seeds. Cricket Hill has specific instructions for growing peonies trees from seeds. I just do not have time or land to grow many peonies. You have 4 open acres, Liz? That's just awesome. You can literally plant as much as you want. No wonder you order 70 plants! Oh boy, you are going to have a splendid spring next year with many new flowers to see. Best of luck. Hope all your new plants will bear you flowers next year.

karen

Vicky,

I got an update from van Bourgondien today, this is what the email said:

Thank you for your recent K.van Bourgondien order.

Unfortunately, the item(s) listed below are currently not available for shipment. We have rescheduled them to ship during the time frame shown below. We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused.

87927 DOUBLE PEONY MIX 09/23/13-10/14/13
88492 TREE PEONY KOUKAMON 09/23/13-10/14/13
88498 TREE PEONY SHIMA-NISHIKI 09/23/13-10/14/13
88499 TREE PEONY YAEZAKURA 09/23/13-10/14/13
01699 TREE PEONIES KAMATA-FUJI 04/14/14-05/05/14

So I'm expecting to get 3 tree peonies this fall and 1 in the spring. I figured the worst that could happen is that I'd have to wait for a refund on my credit card....

Karen, yes, we have 4 open acres of prairie grass over hard clay!! Any new beds I'm doing will probably be raised because it's just too darned hard to dig in and the water retention is dreadful. Space isn't an issue but usable planting area is....

Hopefully I'll be posting a TON of flower pics next spring....

Liz's experience with these companies seems to be consistent with the reviews I've read.

That Yaezakura's gorgeous.

Thanks for all who responded. I ended up ordering some seed for Crickethill. I also ended up ordering YoshinoGawa from Von Borgondien...it turns out they did have them one in stock, apparently, for fall shipping (one of the few, it seems) I got a good deal on that, half price. I also found a website called Paradise Gardens that has reasonable tree peonies and ordered a larger plant from them, Kokyryunishiki. So I am really looking forward to doing some fall planting! May have to raise the soil level to make sure it is well-drained in the spot I have in mind, as sometimes it will have standing water in the spring if we have alot of rain.

I haven't ordered any tree peonies from them but certainly have plenty of their herbaceous, like them a lot! You're probably right about having to raise the soil level or do something to improve drainage, they certainly don't like to have wet roots. I've killed a few that way, spots that aren't wet in the summer but snow stays and melts and creates a early/mid spring bog....

Direct gardening sells dead plants. Dont do business with direct gardening. Direct gardening customer service is the worst. The more expensive plants are often dead when they arrive to you. Dont do business with Direct Gardening.