I'm a huge peony lover who just bought my first house in august—my first chance to grow my own peonies! I planted a TON of peonies right away in the fall to get them started ASAP. Many have come up already and are looking so great. There were just a few I still saw no sign of, so I started to worry those were planted too deep. I scratched at the soil and discovered the eyes of all peonies that didn't appear yet. However, on the very last one, I was scratching and digging and boom! I accidentally snapped a big fat healthy looking red eye right off the peony root. SO TRAGIC!!! I'm assuming (hoping) there were/are other eyes on that root that will allow it to continue to grow (I immediately stopped digging so idk for sure, but I don't really remember planting any peony roots that didn't have multiple eyes). My question is, will that eye that I broke heal itself and grow? I want my precious precious peonies to grow and thrive and I just damaged one, I'm so worried! (Btw—I planted these in a big curving bed on a color gradient, I've got three festiva maximas, 6 Shirley temples, three Sarah Bernhardt, 3 monsieur Jules Eli, and 6 Karl rosenfelds. I wouldn't have had so many but one of the places I ordered from sent me a bunch extra for free (?). The eye broke off a Shirley temple). Elsewhere around the house I planted the fawn, pink Hawaiian coral, princess margaret, dinner plate, dr Alexander Fleming, Catherine fontijn, and riches & fame, along with some old peonies I found hidden in giant clumps of overgrown daylillies that I spent the fall digging up and getting rid of. We have herds of deer next to a 100,000 acre national forest but I've been putting deer repellent pellets in the garden and knock on wood it's kept them away from everything except the rhododendrons (which I may not have applied enough pellets to, naively thinking they wouldn't come that close to the house. I now know they do not care, they go everywhere they want).

to the Forum! No worries, peonies are tough! It is unfortunate that you broke one good eye but the plant can develop another bud and shoot a leaf. There will be no flower probably but the peony will grow and definitely survive!

Whew! Good to know. Thank you!

Welcome Kara! I was weeding in my garden and just broke off a huge peony eye. It happens to all of us.

Throw it away and try not to worry. Hopefully there's more below the ground.

You have to resist the temptation to poke around. We have all learned this the hard way. .

I did admonish one of my peonies to "Grow Damm!t" today as I was staring at it. It's a good thing I don't have neighbors.

@karaelizabeth, welcome to the forum. Your peony will probably be OK. Hope it was not the only bud with a flower.

It is difficult to resist digging, isn't it? I have made a new garden bed for peonies last summer and moved the peonies into this new bed. However, they are not showing up. To make things worse, I planted a bunch of bulbs in the new bed, but they are not showing either. The bulbs in my other garden beds have started growing. I am getting nervous, but I know that I should not dig around. Nail-bitting!

Kara...I have peonies making me nervous too! Thought a vole got one, but sure enough 2 weeks later a tiny leaf is barely poking up.

You have to post pictures of the ones that you freed from the daylilies too!

There probably isn't a single peony grower who hasn't done that same thing—it's just too exciting to see them come up in the spring! Welcome to the peony forum, Kara!

I broke one off Bright Knight recently and it's now showing signs of growth!