2nd Spring for these peonies. We have a 120-peony bed in our first flower farm.

June 1, 2022

Another peony season has arrived! As I drool over armloads and armloads of beautiful blooms on other growers’ Instagram feeds, I can’t help but feel completely, utterly envious. For the past two Springs, I have been disbudding my peony shrubs on my flower farm. ‘Why, oh why, would you ever want to do that?’ you ask. Cause we’re in it for the long haul, baby.

Why disbud peony plants?

Disbudding peony plants allows a newer, younger plant (aged 1-3 years) to keep putting all of its energy into root production. This is important for cut flower growers because we want our plants to be big and robust for the long term, and the focus is in the roots.

How peony plants grow

Peonies shoot new growth stems up from the ground, and are one of the first things you might see waking up in early Spring. In our Western New York Zone 6b, we usually see peonies popping up in the first few weeks of April to mid-April. To be honest though, climate change is giving us all the run around and every year Spring appears at a different time, in an entirely different way.

Each new peony shoot will eventually produce a flower if left alone. More often than not, shoots will produce multiple buds on one stem (in which case, you may decide to remove the side bud so the main bud grows bigger). Most people who grow peonies for enjoyment in the garden leave their shrubs entirely alone and let the plants flower right away with multiple buds on each stem. That is perfectly okay and will not harm the peony plant in any way; however, if you want super robust plants that chug out as many blooms as possible for cut flower production, you’re going to want to sacrifice the first few years of buds.

Here’s how we disbud peony plants

Disbudding peonies is a very simple process. The most important part of disbudding peonies is timing. Upon first glance of a tiny baby bud, that thing needs to come off. Do not put off your disbudding process or you will defeat the purpose of diverting that precious Spring energy into the roots!

Two steps to disbudding peonies

1) Locate baby buds on peony plant and snip each bud off with snips (I actually use my thumb & forefinger to pinch off). Toss buds into a garden bed to decompose into new earth.

2) Do this for the first 2-4 Spring seasons of your bare root peony’s life (I’m doing full disbud for 2 years then in the 3rd year I will disbud half of the buds on each plant).

That’s it!

How to approach peonies throughout their lifespan

Peonies are a wonder plant. They last for a minimum of 30 years and only continue to get bigger and better with age. They’re entirely worth the upfront investment (and subsequent disbudding/waiting for multiple years before seeing a return). Although peonies are drought tolerant, you don’t want your young plants to undergo too much stress during a hot, dry season. Keep them irrigated during droughts… which are occurring much more often and with more severity, thanks again to climate change.

Cut dead foliage back in the Fall (or if you’re me, early Spring). We currently do not use any fertilizers nor soil amendments on the peony bed, but if that changes I will update this blog post. In our new flower farm, we will be planting peonies without landscape fabric and will side dress them with composted manure each season.

peace, love & the sweet scent of peonies in 2023,

Fran Parrish