Description
(caucasica x wittmanniana)
This is a wild hybrid with flowers, which are can be pale pink or creamy to very pale yellow when they open. Regardless of their colour on opening, these all mature to a lovely cerise-infused pink.
The name was validly published (Paeonia ×chameleon Troitsky (1930) ex Grossg) and it is defined there as a wild hybrid between P. caucasica and P. wittmanniana. The name has however been hijacked in horticulture and applied to an artificial cross of unknown parentage made by an American nursery. The flowers of the changeling are nothing like those of the original plant and it is not entitled to the name Chameleon. In addition the name has also been applied to a mlokosewitschii hybrid which is yet again and incorrect usage as the name Chameleon was already validly described and in botanical use.
Sadly seeds from what may have been the original plant and also from the new (changeling) hybrid have also been passed around under the original name, making the identity of the correct plant even less certain.
There has even been speculation that a hybrid of this parentage, in the wild, is also responsible for the plants that we all call Paeonia mlokosewitschii. Whatever the status, the plants offered here do change colour like their namesake, they have very distinct and attractive red stems and were originally raised from caucasica x wittmanniana.
Easy in a well-drained spot, preferably in a humus-rich soil growing in sun or light shade.
