Does anyone know what this is

[Merlins Mum]

Having looked through various garden and plant books and been unable to find this plant in any of them I thought I'd ask you knowledgable lot  :)

We have recently moved and have two of these shrubs/plants growing in the garden.  OH keeps saying it's Japanese Knotweed  ::) please don't tell me he's right :o
One plant is a good 6 foot high and has large seed pods.  OH opened one and said that inside was a very large broad bean, tsk ::)

MM

[Merlins Mum]

[sarah]

hmmm... its not japanese knowtweed.  the leaves look like a peony or tree peony but not sure about the pods.  i'm sure someone will know.

[Palustris]

Not sure what it is, but Japanese knotweed it ain't. See here http://www.knottybits.com/Knotweed/FlwrgMKwdMtqt6Crop.jpg
Can you remember what the flowers looked like?

[Merlins Mum]

tbh I had looked up Japanese Knotweed and knew OH was wrong.  Have no idea what the flowers are like Palustris as we only moved in the second half of July this year and there were no flowers to be seen then.  I think it's lovely but OH has visions of it taking over the entire garden ::) but as it doesn't seem to have runners I'm not at all worried, just curious as to what it is.  Thanks anyway

[saddad]

Well as we all know it isn't Knotweed tell OH to wait until it flowers again so you can get a definitive answer...
;D

[Merlins Mum]

Sorry saddad but I would like to know sooner than that and tbh I think OH is only trying to wind me up  ::)

Sarah I can see what you mean about a peony but I'm sure there were no flowers on the plant when we visited at the end of June, there would have been wouldn't there if it was a peony?

[sarah]

sorry MM i dont know th eanswer. I am sure i have seen this plant before and have googled treepeony and it does look similar but as for the pods and flowering...dunno.  If it is a tree peony it will respond well to pruning apparently, but dont know what time of year.

[Merlins Mum]

Thanks Sarah
We will be pruning it as soon as we have a moment (decorating the loo and bathroom at the moment) and it stops raining of course ::)  Regardless of what the flowers are like, I think it's lovely. :)  I might send some pics to the RHS

MM

[laurieuk]

I would have said for sure that it is a tree peony, it looks like the common yellow one on which the flowers do not last long and so you could have missed seeing them.If I am right you can prune it as hard  as you like, we last year cut ours down about 75 o/o and it has improved it a lot.If you look into the RHS website under plant finder I would think you will find pictures of it.

[Kepouros]

That`s a tree paeony, and it would have finished flowering before the end of June - mine flower late May or early June.  You can certainly prune them fairly hard, but young growths are rather susceptible to frost so I would be tempted to leave pruning until after the plant has flowered and get all the pleasure of the blooms first.

[Carol]

Well at first glance it looked like my Tree Peony but Eric has answered this thread and he has plenty Tree Peonys so maybe it isnt?   soryy.

>:( >:( >:(

[Merlins Mum]

It seems that most of you think it's a tree peony. Thanks everyone

MM