Interesting - when I saw your thread I thought, peonies? Wow they must be farther south than I am. And well, technically you are but only by about 20 miles haha! My peonies seem to be doing okay but I don't expect them to be that big just yet I have one older one which does seem slightly behind now that you draw my attention to it, and the rest are one or two years old, and yes, they are on the small side too. But it's been such a yucky spring. So darn cold. I'm still wearing my winter coat when I leave the house in the morning!

I haven't done a bud count on mine yet, but the one thing I'm hoping is that this darn rain is over and done with when it's time for them to bloom. Otherwise it will be wet tissue season instead of peony season!

:)

Dee

P.S. Is that your house? It looks lovely - I love old houses!

Thanks! Glad I am not alone. You're right, it has been a cold, cloudy month, so maybe it's just that. It does generally seem like everything in the garden woke up early and then promptly went back to sleep.

It is my house - thanks! It is being renovated, so the garden really is one of the few things I can enjoy of it right now.

Ive noticed that i have fewer blooms and those that are flowering are noticeably smaller than normal. i wonder if its due to the terrible drought that we had last summer. i live in Fairfield County also.

I spent a fair amount of time yesterday searching for info on Peony Leaf Curl because a couple of my peonies have curled leaves and look fairly stressed. Some are behind in growth, while others are exuberantly large. I do not remember there being such a contrast in different ones in previous years. All my peonies are 8 or more years old, so it isn't based on them still settling in. I do have some vole/mole activity near them and have wondered if root disturbance could be causing some set back. Also we have had a real roller coaster of temperatures with it bouncing between unseasonable highs and lows so I wonder if growth spurts then cold spells could contribute to the weirdness. Was very dry/drought last year and I did not water them much. Many factors may be involved here obviously. I am keeping an eye of them for now--nothing seems off enough to remove them but it is concerning.

Okay, phew. More evidence that I'm not alone. I have drip lines in this bed which I used pretty frequently throughout last summer, so I *think* mine should have received adequate water. But who knows. I'm experiencing almost the same phenomenon as Iowa Blooms - one plant has a good number of nice-sized buds, and one has absolutely puny buds. Even with my two Itohs, one has two very large buds (normal for this plant), and one has 4-5 miniscule buds. Just weird!

I have 11 stems and buds on my Sarah Bernhardt (container grown) and they have stalled and will probably not grow and bloom. If the 5 years or so I have had it (from bare root), I had a total of one bloom (last year). I will just have to get rid of it at this point.