Hi Catherinet, I have a hardy Perry's giant sunburst. It was planted as a tuber by a guy that works on my pond. He planted it in a container that is 24" in diameter - not sure of the depth. But he said the pot was plenty big enough, and I could keep it in the same pot for several years. He planted it in black cow. He planted it in the early spring and it shot up leaves pretty quickly. The leaves stayed green and nice up until about a month ago and as I said started to turn brown around the edges. My pond man is here in the area only during the winter and spring and then heads back up north so I called him and he said maybe it was too hot - I have the container sunk into the soil and the area around it has little flat river stones. But I always heard lotus really like the heat. Anyway maybe some of this info will help you help me. Thanks.

I'd leave them both alone. The bigger ones probably don't have quite as much new material to generate as the more closely trimmed plants do. The shorter trimmed plants are making a flush of new growth since they were trimmed shorter. I think they'll both end up equal by the end of the season. Most of the time lots of the foliage that the plant arrives with will dry up and fall off to be replaced by new growth within two months of planting anyway. Janet

There does seem to be a big gap between even the big hybridizers on the same variety of peony. Southern Peony Blog writer actually did a spreadsheet on the difference in prices for Itoh peonies, I was shocked by the extreme difference. The growers she listed advertised the same size roots, too. I tend to search between several main growers, have a few that I absolutely prefer, but if the price is much different I'll buy from several different places. Fina is a favorite as is Hollingsworth and A&D. Fina had absolutely massive roots last year, it'll be interesting to see if they produce more flowers than typical for the 3-5 eye divisions sent by everyone else. Hollingsworth and A&D sent very nice divisions but their customer service is what sets them apart from the others selling similar sized roots. The roots I received from Van Engelen this spring were not big enough to produce flowers this year, assume yours would be similar. The only time I've ever planted a bareroot peony in the spring and had a bloom the same season was one from Gilbert Wilde. Just luck there because it was a typical 3-5 eye division, no better or worse looking than the other 15 or so I planted at the same time. They have a rep for mis-labeling roots but I've never gotten a bad one from them and their prices are good, I put in at least 1 order from them every year.

I usually ad 1 tablespoon per gallon of fresh made 5.1.1 mix. Perfect lime since that is what most use.