Paeonia lactiflora Green Lotus

The Green Lotus Peony lactiflora is a hybrid herbaceous Peony that offers truly unusual, astonishing, fragrant, gentle and delicate flowers. It is a recent variety with mid-season flowering, bearing large blooms composed of long twisted petals, of an irregular shape, white streaked with pale green and sometimes marked with small dark pink streaks on the edges. They reveal a centre filled with golden yellow stamens. Without doubt an original creation!

Chinese herbaceous peonies are mainly derived from Paeonia lactiflora, a perennial herbaceous plant native to central and eastern Asia (from eastern Tibet, northern China to eastern Siberia), where it naturally grows in woods and meadows. This plant belongs to the Ranunculaceae or Paeoniaceae Family. Herbaceous peonies, perennial by virture of their roots, form a clump of foliage that completely disappears in winter.

The Green Lotus Peony was hybridised by Roy G. Klehm in Illinois (United States) in 1995. From spring the plant forms a herbaceous and bushy clump, moderately dense, reaching 90 cm (35in) in all directions. Its 10 to 13 cm (4 to 5in) diameter flowers appear in mid-season, around June depending on the climate, lasting for about three weeks. Blooms appear at the end of the stems, but also from some secondary buds. They emerge as a cream-white bud and then open into a large flower with a pattern reminiscent of a cactus dahlia. The vegetation of this variety is good and it has remarkable longevity. The young foliage, purple and shiny, unfolds into large, dark green, highly dissected leaves. They are borne on a petiole that divides into 3, with lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate segments. The leaflets are entire or sometimes lobed. The vegetation disappears in winter, while the buds persist at ground level and will develop in spring. This long-lived perennial plant grows from a large fleshy root that does not appreciate being moved.

Chinese peonies are among those plants that form the basis of a garden. The Green Lotus Peony can be planted in a border or alongside a pathway, combined with timeless and unpretentious perennials such as Irises, Columbines, Campanulas, Perennial Geraniums, Carnations or Christmas Roses. It can also be grown in the vegetable garden to supply cut flowers for the house. Pot cultivation is not recommended, as its needs will not be met. Over time, the peony becomes majestic and blooms more abundantly, producing up to 60 flowers. By combining different varieties with staggered flowering, it is possible to have flowers for 6 weeks from spring to early summer.