Just when you thought you were finished w/pruning your hydrangeas, now I tell you it's time to "pinch prune" them. But wait - someone said I'm not supposed to cut them at all! Yes and no.

The plant "Audrey" from "Little Shop of Horrors" Credit: Wiki Did your hydrangeas whisper "Feed Me" as you admired them today? If not, they should have because it's high time to fertilize your hydrangeas. Although their needs are similar, you fertilize each a bit differently, so let's take them one by one. Your bigleaf hydrangeas ( macrophyllas ) and mountain ( serrata s) should be flowering by now and if they are rebloomers, need encouragement to set up those second set of buds. If they are not rebloomers, they will soon set their buds for next year, so get busy and give them a little love. What might that be? A b asic tree/shrub product with an NPK ratio of 3-1-2, 6-2-4, etc. You might be surprised to learn that rose fertilizer is ideal. Here's just one you might see at a garden center.  Try to avoid using something like 10-10-10 or even 5-5-5. No plant uses nutrients in equal amounts and add...

This is the second of two reports on winter's impact on my hydrangeas. A brief recap here. In my last post, I detailed how I went out in May to assess winter's damage, fearing the worst. We had had a 2 week stretch of exceptionally cold winter weather which typically freezes the flowers buds that sleep in the stems of hydrangeas that bloom on old wood. You can get all the details on that report by going to https://bit.ly/2lRGNlm   So now it's time to tell you what happened to my mountain hydrangeas, botanically known as hydrangea serrata. A little background here. Mountain hydrangeas are so called because they come from the mountains of Japan and Korea . The best part of that heritage is that they are better adapted to sustain cold climates and winter conditions. Which is just dandy for those of us who have to put up with Mother Nature's challenges.   Unlike my bigleaf hydrangea macrophyllas, every single one of my mountain hydrangeas had flower buds on ...

Time to report on winter's impact on my hydrangeas. In early May, I went out to my Zone 5 garden to see what winter had done to my hydrangeas that bloom on old wood: macrophyllas (big leaf) and hydrangea serratas (mountain). I also checked on the quercifolias (oak leaf) and petiolaris (climbing).   I held my breath, fearing the worst since we had a brutal 2 week spell of cold temperatures to close out 2017 and begin 2018 in southwest CT :

In my last blog post, I said I would write next about what happened to my hydrangeas after last winter, but I must tell you first about what's happening right now: climbing hydrangeas are in bloom in my garden and they are fabulous!!