Hello everyone 1st post .

I have a tree peony , it is planted in a south facing border in zone 9 . Get sun at least 6-8 hrs a day at moment. It was transplanted from a pot about 6/5/20.

The soil is not the best and I'm pretty sure the graft is below the soil . Please see pics.
I admit the soil is not the best but not too bad and I added compost to planting area before planting and aim to improve the soil as I go .

The leaves started yellowing /fading from about 3 days in , branches seemed brittle so I used liquid miracle grow to fertilise.

A week later the plant seems worse and I'm unsure where to go from here .
I might dig up and put in a pot so I can bring back to health .
Also suspicious of disease but not sure .
Any comments appreciated

So I'm not quite sure what's going on here

Do not fertilize anything that just has being transplanted for at least a week. Trees and shrubs - even longer, months. You have to make a sun cover for your tree peony at least for a few weeks. And I suggest moving it to another location, because south facing tree peony in zone 9 is sure thing to commit herbi-cide. Probably north-facing wall is a best option.

AlexUnder said:Do not fertilize anything that just has being transplanted for at least a week. Trees and shrubs - even longer, months. You have to make a sun cover for your tree peony at least for a few weeks. And I suggest moving it to another location, because south facing tree peony in zone 9 is sure thing to commit herbi-cide. Probably north-facing wall is a best option.

Wow , I followed the label advice and it said full sun . The weather here where I am , north east uk is infamous for a lack of sun and also cloudy/rainy a lot of the time . So I think I can rule out too much sun as the cause of damage to my peony tree.
I think it could possibly of been over watered and like you say fertilised too early.
I was mainly worried about the watering and the depth of planting. What do you think from the pictures ? Thanks !

Oh, you are in UK... My apologies, I thought you were in US zone 9, which is certainly nothing like UK zone 9. Do not overwater and I think you planted it too close to the shed/wall. Peonies need space to grow and at least 3 ft in each direction from center makes sense. It could grow huge, so let us know if you know the variety you got. The deeper you plant tree peony - the better. I planted mine up to the first leaves, but it is hard to evaluate based on pics only. How deep are the roots? Generally tree peonies are grafted on herbaceous peonies roots, so planting it deeper makes sure that herbaceous plant is not going to develop together with tree peony.

Still cover it against sun with a chair or something like that for a 10 days and see how it goes. It may be just a transplant shock.

If you are are in UK just ignore my advice to replant it to the north-facing wall.

I agree with Alex. The peony will need more space to grow. Unfortunately, the foundation is too close. There are a couple of issues with this. Rainfall is one of them. The area close to the foundation will probably never receive enough rain. Furthermore, the foundation may be porous and absorb water taking it from the peony.

As per the depth, I really cannot tell without seeing the grafting point, which is supposed to be good 4-6 inches below the soil level:

https://graefswinning.be/en/co...

I've happily planted up to the third level of leaf branches, which is about two times deeper that recommended above. It is very cold overhere and I wanted to be on the safe side and protect the scion. The idea is to enable the TP roots to develop from the grafted TP branches. You are lucky that your TP has three branches. For example, if something happens to one the branches, the other two can continue growing roots.

AlexUnder said:Oh, you are in UK... My apologies, I thought you were in US zone 9, which is certainly nothing like UK zone 9. Do not overwater and I think you planted it too close to the shed/wall. Peonies need space to grow and at least 3 ft in each direction from center makes sense. It could grow huge, so let us know if you know the variety you got. The deeper you plant tree peony - the better. I planted mine up to the first leaves, but it is hard to evaluate based on pics only. How deep are the roots? Generally tree peonies are grafted on herbaceous peonies roots, so planting it deeper makes sure that herbaceous plant is not going to develop together with tree peony.

Still cover it against sun with a chair or something like that for a 10 days and see how it goes. It may be just a transplant shock.

If you are are in UK just ignore my advice to replant it to the north-facing wall.

Thanks for the advice I'll make a makeshift cover up . The tree is a paeonia 'suffruticosa' .... I see what you mean about the space , I need to remove some ugly shrubs from my garden and I'll move the tree in their place. I haven't had the time this year yet as I've just moved house and quickly threw a few plants in to brighten garden up.

I hadva good look at base of plant and noticed a few buds above the ground so I've raised the level of soil to above the top bud with some compost then watered lightly . Hopefully I can get this plant thriving . After a bit research i havent done the plant any favours by fertilizing and over watering aswell 😞. Anyway, hopefully I'll get this plant back to health and I'll update post so you can see the outcome . 👍