It's time to start preparing your hydrangeas for winter. With autumn's official start right around the corner on September 22, it' a good time to start to get your plants ready for winter while the weather is still pleasant and mild.

If you're wondering when to transplant your bigleaf hydrangea ( macrophylla ), now is it. It's one of the questions that often comes up during my lectures and talks as audiences realize they need to move their plants. Why would you want to move your plant? Here are a couple of reasons: it has grown too big for its space and you always find yourself needing to cut it back which often results in fewer flowers. You either cut it at the wrong time or you damage it when you cut it. Or you realize that it is too exposed to winter weather and always dies back to the ground like the one in this photo and maybe that wouldn't happen if it was in a different place. Or you never get around to it in time or whatever. Why move it now?  Late August/early September is a good time to make this move to give the plant time to establish roots before it goes completely dormant or winter comes and the ground freezes. Secondly, you can monitor it while it still has foliage which c...

Hydrangea paniculatas including 'Limelight' are in full bloom in my part of the U.S. right now. And the reblooming big leaf hydrangeas like Let's Dance® Rhythmic Blue® continue to produce their repeat blooms like the one in this photo . Fortunately, we have had generous unprecedented mid-season rain that has helped to keep all the flowers coming and colorful.

    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...