Peony I believe.

agree ... and either very young.. or very unhappy

why is your soil cracked.. this early in spring ....???

and how bad does it get when the heat of summer hits.. and or drought starts usually in august?

ken

We’re in a new home as of last July and I suspect it’s been cut down or weeded for who knows how long. @ken_adrian Adrian MI cold Z5, we have clay soil. The soil gets hard, dry, and cracked enough to have shocked my Dad. He’s in central IL and has better soil than me.

I’ve been appliying a locally made soil conditioner. Apparently, the soil in our area is genrally clay-y and alkeline.

How many years will it take for this peony to recover and bloom? And can I transplant it now?

The usual time to transplant peopnies is mid-late August. Is there a reason why you’d need to do it sooner? When you transplant, be careful not to bury too deeply the ’eyes’ that show the site where new growth will occur. They should be just below the surface. It is burying the eyes too deep that is most often responsible for delays in flowering.

In your pucture there are low-growing green leaves of a different plant on the right side of the peony. They look like garlic-mustard weed seedlings to me! If that is what they are, remove them as they are a weed pest and some research shows them to be alleopathic.

The other leaves are Glechoma hederaceae.