Rose and peony (closed, reference only) Nursery  

Listing last updated on Wed Aug 2024

Yamamoto,
Japan

[From The Tree Peonies, by John C. Wister & Harold E. Wolfe, 1955, p. 18:]
About this time [1920s], catalogs reached this country from Chugai Shokubutsu Yen, a nursery growing all, or at least a good part of the tree peonies they offered, in contrast to the earlier socalled nurseries which merely bought plants from small growers and resold them. These catalogs gave good descriptions of two hundred or so varieties, dividing them into "Choice," "Selected," "New and Rare," "Newest," and "Miscellaneous" varieties, and for good measure added "Winter-Flowering Varieties." Of the last named varieties, they carefully explained they did not mean that they flowered in winter! To them the term meant that in their climate the plants wo~ld produce some flowers in the autumn until stopped by cold weather. They also explained that by crimson they often meant to convey the color that Americans called light pink, or that they meant a white flower with blotches of deep red. They were at least honest in calling to the atterition of prospective customers what the English terms they used meant to them. The Chugai varieties imported in the 1920's and early 1930's proved to be the handsomest to reach this country. Not only that, they were true to descriptions, and re-orders brought the same variety under the same name. It is from these varieties that we had for the first time an opportunity to know what we meant when we mentioned 'Akashi-gata,' 'Dokushin-den,' 'Iro-no-seki,' or other named variety. It is unfortunate for us that the Chugai Nursery went out of business either shortly before or during World War II