Peonies: the six-week Irish season, meaning and care

A peony plant takes three years in the ground before it crops properly, flowers for about two weeks, and cannot be persuaded into a glasshouse to do it year round. That is the whole explanation for the price, and the reason peonies remain the one flower where seasonality still bites in Ireland.

Buy them in late May or June and they are the best value in the shop. Buy them in October and you are paying for a cold store in the Netherlands or a flight from Chile.

What peonies mean

The peony carries a happy marriage, prosperity and good fortune, and that meaning comes out of Chinese tradition, where the flower is a longstanding emblem of wealth and honour. It travelled into western florist usage largely intact, helped by the flower's own extravagance.

In the Victorian language of flowers the peony meant bashfulness, which is not a meaning anyone applies now and which sits oddly on a flower the size of a fist. It is also the twelfth wedding anniversary flower in the modern anniversary lists, which is florist convention rather than old tradition.

The practical reading in Ireland is simpler: peonies say occasion. They are what people choose when the flowers are the gift rather than the accompaniment to one.

Season in Ireland

Irish peonies flower outdoors in late May and June. Several Irish flower farms grow them for exactly that window and sell to florists and at markets, and the difference is visible: a field-grown Irish peony is heavier, more scented and less uniform than an imported stem.

Imports stretch the season either side. Dutch glasshouse and Israeli stems arrive from March, southern-hemisphere and cold-stored stems appear in autumn, and both cost two to three times the June price. If you want peonies for a specific date that is not in May or June, budget accordingly or choose something else. Garden roses and ranunculus fill a similar shape for less.

When to send them, and when not to

Peonies suit a summer wedding, a big birthday, an engagement, or any June gesture where the flower is meant to be noticed. They are the reason a June wedding is cheaper than an April one to flower, since the peony that costs a fortune in spring is a seasonal stem by then. Our wedding flower costs page has the wider budget picture.

Do not plan them for Irish Mother's Day. It falls on the fourth Sunday of Lent, always in March, months before an Irish peony exists. The stems available that week are imported, expensive and often cut too tight to open. Tulips or daffodils, in season and local, are a better flower that week and cost a quarter of the price.

Do not send them somewhere they need to last. Six days is normal. A peony is a short, spectacular flower and pretending otherwise leads to disappointment.

Care

Choose buds that give when squeezed. A bud that feels like a marshmallow will open; a hard green ball was cut too early and will stay shut.

Re-cut 3cm off each stem on a slant. Peony stems are woody at the base and a fresh cut matters more here than on a soft-stemmed flower. Strip the lower leaves, which are large and foul the water quickly.

Warm water in a warm room opens them within hours. Cold water in a cool room holds them back, which is how to stage a bunch for a date three days away: keep them cool, then bring them into the warm the morning of.

Change the water every second day. Peonies drink heavily as they open and a vase can empty faster than you expect. Once open, keep them out of direct sun, and take the fruit bowl off the same table, since ethylene shortens them sharply.