Hello! Last year, I ordered 12 peonies from Hollingsworth. All of them came up for the most part, but I noticed two peonies are struggling.

The first one being Bartzella that has a stem that came up damaged And now wilted. Should I dig up the roots and see if there are any other healthy eyes? The second one is Pink Hawaii, it appears to have blight? Should I cut my loss and destroy the plant. I am not sure if I contact Hollingsworth regarding that? I have over 20 peonies (15 roses) and none of them have blight, so I don't think it's from here. Would love some advice here! Just a little frustrated that I spend over $100 between the two and they didn't turn out well.

Thank you!!

Hi Miny,
I would not dig up the Bartzella.

Were both peonies planted in the Fall?

I see you are in zone 7a. That's my zone, too. Did you get that late freeze in April! I did, and I have established plants that look just as bad as"Pink Hawaii " ( did you mean Pink Hawaiian Coral?)

Do you know about SuperThrive? You can buy it in garden centers or on Amazon. I myself have had good luck using it on peonies that are struggling.

Please keep us posted.

It's probably worth at least writing a message to the seller.
A few years back I planted a Garden Treasure that seemed completely dead in the Spring, so I wrote the nursery which sold it to me and they told me to wait a couple more weeks because that peony seems to take an inordinate amount of time to start sprouting the first Spring after being replanted.
The plant is still in my garden. Huge flowers, albeit it's the least vigorous grower among all my Itoh's.

Bartzella's are among the toughest, most vigorous peonies I've seen. They can be mowed to the ground in late Spring and still will find the strength to come back. However they don't like having "soggy feet", even more so than other peonies: "well drained soil" is the key, as is changing watering habits according to weather conditions.
It seems you are using mulch from the picture... personally I am split on the issue of mulching when it comes to peonies. On one side it keeps them free from weeds, especially strangler vines, but on the other it may keep the soil too wet and increase mosture too much around the stems and crown.

LG, it does look like something caused by frost, and not only on the peony. The violet leaves around have some damaged spots. I would wait a bit. However I would also let the grower know. Just in case...

Sorry for the super late reply! I seem to have missed the notification!

I am happy to report that bartzella is doing much better! I had two plant shoot(?) wilted away since I posted, but one came up fine and the leaves look healthy!

As for the pink hawaii coral, it's looking even sadder than before. I am not quite sure what to do and hadn't contacted Hollingsworth yet. I will give superthrive a try (thanks Mieko2 for the suggestion!). I'll report back if I have any success!

Thanks everyone!!!!

I actually lost Pink Hawaiian Coral at least twice before I got it to grow in my garden. I'm in a much colder zone than you and, I think anyway, it was severely damaged by very cold weather after it emerged and never recovered. And by never recovered I mean that the emerging stems blackened and died back and had absolutely no new growth that season or subsequent years. Said I wasn't going to replace it, very frustrating to have it die before even seeing a single bud, but gave it one more try after seeing a mature, blooming bush of it in a WI garden. I planted it at max recommended depth in one of the coldest beds in my garden (comes up a full 2-3 weeks later than the warmest beds) and it's done well since then other than this year's hail storm. There are some peonies that are advertised as frost intolerant, this one isn't, but I believe it should be. Don't know about once it's established—maybe tougher then.
I'd contact Hollingsworths via email with a pic of your peony. Don't be surprised if you don't get a reply right away; they're in the process of relocating a huge amount of roots right now, you'll see references to it if you follow them on Facebook and in the new offerings they placed on their website over the last couple of weeks. If they haven't contacted you in a few weeks try again. Most likely there's nothing wrong except for cold damage but you want written proof in case we're wrong.

Ouch! If this one doesn't make it, maybe I'll look for an established Pink Hawaiian coral in pots next year. I am not entirely convince that it's cold damage because we had a really mild winter and a delay spring in NY. I'll have to reach out to Hollingsworth and see if they have any recommendation.