A heavy sort of beauty,
yet delicate to the eye.
The peony welcomes the late spring sunshine,
and bears the burden of its rains.
Nourished, yet strained,
she bows to the beginning of summer.
– Ed Lehming

The peonies keep coming, and despite the rains, they are holding up quite well. As I’ve said before, how they hold up their heavy flowers is a real marvel. As I clip blossoms to photograph them, I am challenged to find a way to hold them up to photograph them. They either droop or pull the supports over. They are that heavy.

The blossom above is probably one of the heaviest so far. It’s thick magenta blossom is much larger than the earlier varieties which have been blooming in my gardens for the past few weeks. As you can also see, there are sub-blossoms ready to bloom as well, but they will yield smaller flowers.

This is my first year of really paying close attention to my peonies. Probably because they are all blooming around the same time. Since they are almost all from my mother-in-law, some have taken a few years to establish enough to come to full bloom. I had not realized that similar coloured blooms are actually different varieties. Such is the joy of gardening and learning.

My next challenge will be to figure out the names of these heirloom peonies.

Nikon D800
Tamron SP AF 90mm f/2.8 Di Macro 1:1 (272ENII)@90mm
1.6 sec, f/36.0 ISO 100

High Resolution image on 500px

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