peony

tom.. focus.. its fall.. PM is prevalent.. warm days.. damp nights ...

it is not a reason to dispose of plants ... these can live 100 years ...

besides the fact.. that i dont see any PM in this pic ...

after the first frost .. cut to the ground.. perhaps leaving 3 inch stalks .. so you recall its there in spring ... clean up all the refuse..

and enjoy it next year

ken

Ken,

I posted a photo from a few weeks ago because I thought it would be easier to ID. Most of the leaves are now completely covered in powdery mildew and have more yellowing and brown spots.

It comes back fine every spring but I'm trying to learn more about my plants to take better care of them. Starting with the trouble makers :)

PM is PREVENTED.. not solved ..

full fall cleanup as i noted..

and then in late spring.. start a spraying schedule..

for PM... its as simple as baking soda mixed in water.. whats that all about.. lol ...

PM triggers.. when warm muggy nights start building..

and PM is increased incredibly.. if you bath your plants in water after work every evening.. making them wet in darkness.. been there.. done that ...

dry leave at night .. really help ...

ken

The plants usually only receive rainwater. When they do get irrigated it's in the early morning. Every fall I know I need to start spraying but I never seem to do it until it's too late. I don't think I've tried baking soda yet.

They're cut back every year and the foliage is removed.

There are other plants that are susceptible to PM in the same area but these are the only ones that get it really bad. Either because of lack of management or the PM these don't seem all that great. If with a little more care these can look better I'd be happy but wouldn't mind replacing them.

Any idea what they are? Closest plant I could find searching through images is a peony but the foliage seems lighter.

That is a peony. Peony foliage varies from dark green to light green.

BTW ... your peony looks off.. too short ...

its pips .. should be at ground level ... and it looks like you have mounded a few inches of mulch on top ...

the first sign of a plant being planted too deep.. is a short plant..

you might want to consider widening that bed and pulling the mulch back from the crown ...

also.. having dry bed mulch .. as compared to a wet lawn, close to the plant.. at night .... might alleviate some of the disease issues ...

ken

Lisanti thanks for the ID.

Ken,

In general these aren't doing that great. They don't look as good as even some of the mediocre photos I've seen online.

I don't fertilize them frequently and when I do it's usually with Plant Tone (5-3-3). Next year I'm going to also be using either Flower-Tone (3-4-6) or Garden-Tone (3-4-4) for the flowering plants. I'll probably put down some shortly and again in the spring. In the future I won't fertilize as much but this bed has been neglected a bit. Sounds good?

The picture above was taken before applying fertilizer. The foliage grew quite a bit after fertilizer. It's about 2' tall now. The others are shorter and have worse PM.

I'm doing some work on the lawn and was planning to widen that bed a bit in a couple of weeks.

What's a pip?

The pips are the buds for next year's growth; take a look at the first picture in the link below - the little pink/red things are the pips, and they should be just barely below ground level.

Peonies are heavy feeders, and should be fed a couple of times during the year; I like Plant-Tone myself, but every so often I give mine a shot of non-organic 10-10-10.

Here is a link that might be useful: look at first picture