Fuchsia-licious!

Photo, Dan Ryan

It's early May and my Chinese tree peony is already blooming! Glad the weather is cool—hopefully it will stay in bloom for a good length of time. This beauty was a gift from a landscaper who was working at a neighbor's house one day when it was raining very heavily. He and his helper were drenched, so when they rain stopped I brought them each a dry t-shirt. A week or so later he brought this tree to me as a thank-you for the dry t-shirts (which he also returned, freshly laundered). Turns out he is a former scientist who is also passionate about tree peonies, and regularly goes to China to find new species. He actually grew this one from seed! Don't you just love garden stories like this?

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Just in case you didn't know... Fuchsia—a synonym of magenta and often misspelled—is a bold reddish or pinkish purple color named after blossom of the fuchsia plant, which was named after the German scientist Leonhart Fuchs. And it's my favorite "happy color." Now you know!