NEW STRAIN OF HYBRID PEONIES

By Prof. A. P. Saunders, Clinton, N.. Y.

American Peony Society Bulletin No. 34 - June 1928

It is now eleven years since I began to work on the production of hybrids between the ordinary Chinese peonies and the varieties of P. OFFICINALIS. The first blooms were produced in 1924 and since then each year has brought a new group to maturity. This strain is now sufficiently well established so that it may be of interest to discuss some of its characters.

The seedlings which have so far come into bloom with me are these:

Four hybrids using pollen of a single officinalis variety on the single white Chinese peony The Bride. These are all single crimsons.

Thirty-one hybrids using pollen of a single officinalis variety on double white or yellowish Chinese peonies (PRIMEVERE, FUJI MINE, a White Jap., and a third plant, a seedling of the type of PRIMEVERE). These are also without exception single crimsons.

Seven hybrids using sinensis pollen (probably mixed pollen from double and single sorts) on OFFICINALIS RUBRA PLENA. All these seven are full doubles, six of them double crimsons and the seventh a double pink.

One hybrid using pollen of sinensis on a single officinalis. This proved to be a very small almost black flowered single.

OFFICINALIS PARENT CONTROLS DOUBLENESS

It is a curious fact that the character of doubleness or singleness is apparently determined by the officinalis parent in every case. Also, that except for the one case of a double pink in the third group, the officinalis parent determines the color.

With respect to the general habit of the plants, the female parent seems to have most to say. All of the 35 hybrids in the first and second groups are tall plants, quite as tall as the average Chinese peony and much taller than their officinalis parent. Two of them, of which I happen to have measurements, showed a height of 33 and 40 inches respectively, while the two officinalis varieties ROSEA PLENA and STRIATA ELEGANS measured on the same day, had only 26-inch stems; and the effective difference is much larger than these figures indicate, since the officinalis varieties have a sprawling habit, and the actual stature of the plants was not by any means equal to the length of the stem, whereas the hybrids, having thick, stiff, straight stems have an effective height as great as the actual stem length.

BLOOMING TIME SAME AS OFFICINALIS

In the third group the plants are variable in stature, some being quite dwarf, others very tall.

The foliage is in general intermediate, but inclines rather to the officinalis than to the sinensis parentage; it is usually coarser than that of the officinalis varieties.

In blooming time these plants come with officinalis, but they have a longer duration and the height of their season laps over into the beginning of the sinensis season. Some, indeed, go on longer, for in 1927 I cut a bloom of one of the double hybrids on July 12. The year 1927 was, it is true, a very late year; but the Chinese peonies were in full bloom here before July 1, and very few of them were still hanging on as late as the 12th. This hybrid strain in that year had a total season of more than a month for the first recorded bloom was on June 10.

The real question, however, for the peony fancier is as to the actual beauty and value of these hybrids. My opinion is that for the garden they will certainly prove an important addition. As cut flowers for the house, the singles have great beauty, but whether they would have any commercial value in that way I am not so sure; it may well be that some of the double form would better meet the exacting demands of the cut flower trade.

SINGLES ARE THE MOST STRIKING

The striking individuals so far in this race are the singles on account of their stature, size and color. At their best they are immense upstanding, cup-shaped blooms of the most intense glowing and 1 vidid crimson color with a very effective group of stamens sometimes striped with red. A measurement gave eight inches for the diameter of one of the larger blooms, and on the largest of all nine and one" half inches; but many are smaller. The best of them, and especially those which lean towards the dark mahogany shades, hold their color extremely well until the petals fall, but some unfortunately show a tendency to go off towards the end into inferior purplish tints.

The entire strain is sterile both as to its pollen and also as to its ability to set seed, although most of the singles form immense furry seedpods capacious enough to hold a heavy crop of seeds if therii were such. This sterility no doubt adds to the length of life of the individual blooms and it is true that they last extremely well.

It is strange that this cross was not made long ago, for it is not one that offers any particular difficulty, although the yield of seeds is always small. I have been told that hybrids of this strain have been produced in Holland but I cannot vouch for the truth of the statement. In this country there have been several growers who have worked on it besides myself during recent years and the beginnings must have been made at almost the same date by all, and quite independently. The first to stage any blooms at an exhibition was Lyman D. Glasscock of Joliet, Illinois, who showed a bloom of such a hybrid at the peony show in Des Moines in 1924. Since then they have appeared at several of the Peony Society's exhibitions. W. S. Bockstoce of Pittsburgh, Pa., Edward Auten, or., of Princeville, Ill., and A. E. Kunderd of gladiolus fame, in Goshen, Ind., have all achieved success with this cross, and Mr. Kunderd promises to put two of his single varieties on the market this year.