Cooking Peonies for winter. 5 Mistakes That Most Summer Residents Make

Gorgeous lush peonies are one of the most "winter-hardy" flowers! But there is a risk of ruining them during the cold season, if a few mistakes are made in the autumn. About which I decided to tell you based on my personal experience with these flowers!

Excess fertilization

Naturally, the florist's desire to "feed" the plants and, unfortunately, usually for this purpose they ask the peonies more and more! But it is important to understand - first of all, it is unacceptable to introduce nitrogen in autumn, as it stimulates the growth of stems.

And it is dangerous to "overfeed" peonies even with really necessary potassium and phosphorus.

Both substances are enough for 15-20 g for each bush. It is worth increasing the dose - and next year peonies will not bloom at all.

Hot shelter

Scientists keep repeating that the best "blanket" for flower crops is a thick snow cover. Once I thoroughly insulated the tree-like peonies, and as a result, they matted during the winter, part of the bushes in the spring had to be dug up and burned due to rot.

Whereas, in reality, it was enough to build huts of spruce branches or a frame of wood around them, and on top - to pull the burlap, then wait for the snow.

Manure mulching

One of the best fertilizer products, manure is excellent for mulching many vegetable crops, but for floral and peonies are no exception, it is dangerous, since it provokes the development of putrefactive diseases.

To avoid this problem, I recommend mulching the peonies with fallen leaves, straw, peat, and ideally using sphagnum moss for this purpose.

The fact is that it contains carbolic acid, which gives it an antiseptic property.

Premature pruning

From late summer to late autumn, peonies accumulate nutrients and in order for them to enter the underground part, the aboveground part must be preserved.

If you hurry with pruning - you can forget about colorful, long, abundant flowering! So with the "haircut" you need to wait until the first frost.

For the Middle Lane, this is, in theory, the second half of October-early November.

Insufficient pruning

In principle, you can do it simply with any peonies - cutting their stems almost flush with the soil level, keeping the hemp literally 2-3 cm.

And only for peonies transplanted this year, an exception should be made - keeping 10-15 cm in length.

So it turns out that there are not so many dangerous mistakes in caring for peonies before winter, which means that they will not cause much trouble even for a novice florist!