Candy Apple™ Itoh Peony

If you haven’t heard of Itoh peonies, you are in for a real treat. Also called intersectional hybrids, these spectacular plants are crosses between Chinese tree peonies and regular herbaceous peonies. They grow like herbaceous peonies, and are just as winter-hardy, but the leaves are more like tree peonies, with pointed lobes, and the amazing flowers are up to 9 inches across, also like tree peonies. Take the Candy Apple™ Itoh Peony, one of our favorites, which has spectacular frilly flowers of deep red – the first double red Itoh on the market. These nestle among the leaves a little, so no staking is needed, and there are secondary side-buds that keep the flowering season going for several weeks. Forming a bush about 3 feet tall and wide within a few years, this great plant, with its beautiful foliage, looks great even when not blooming. A fantastic addition to your perennial gardens, growing among shrubs, in rock gardens, or of course in a Japanese-themed garden, this wonderful plant is perfect if you live in a cold region too cold for tree peonies, but love their spectacular flowers. In hot zones you can’t grow herbaceous peonies, but you can grow this one, so it’s a win-win wherever you are in the country.

• Enormous 7-9 inch frilly blooms of rich red
• Jagged, deeply-cut leaves like tree peonies
• Grows like a regular peony and needs the same care
• Cold hardy at least to zone 4
• A cross between a tree peony and an herbaceous one

Plant your Candy Apple™ Itoh Peony in full sun or with a little afternoon shade. Grow it in rich, moist, well-drained soil of any type – it loves plenty of good compost added when preparing the hole, and also as an annual mulch in fall. When planting, keep the part of the plant where the stems join the leaves just 1 inch below the soil surface – deep planting will delay flowering for years. Remove dead flowers as they fade, and cut back the foliage in fall, after it yellows – no more care is needed. Be sure you have chosen where you want it, because once established it is difficult to transplant. It may take a couple of growing seasons before you see flowers, but once they start they will be reliable every year. Deer don’t eat this plant, and it doesn’t have any pest or disease problems, living for many years.