hydrangea conjure up images of an sometime - fashioned garden , with their ticklish , lacy blooms of pinkish , blue , purple or whitened . These woody bush , native to Asia , come in many cultivar . Variegated hydrangea have greenish parting with white marbling or margins . Favorite variegated cultivars admit Quadricolor , Maculata , Silver Variegated Mariesii and Light group O ' solar day .
Step 1
institute your vary hydrangea in a partly shady area with moist , well - drained soil . Too much shade can keep your hydrangea from blossom , according to the U.S. National Arboretum . Do not take a juiceless , Laputan website . extravagant wind will cause the leaves to cursorily desiccate and the industrial plant to droop , according to the University of Rhode Island Landscape Horticulture Program .
Step 2
Water weekly during the first season after planting your hydrangea . After that , water exhaustively only during dry patch . go for 2 to 3 inches of mulch around the basis of the works and outward to its dribble line to aid hold wet .
Step 3
Cover your hydrangea , if call for , during belated spring freezes to protect it from flower bud impairment . you may use lite blankets or sheets . transfer the covers once the temperature rises above freezing .
Step 4
exchange your works ’s blossom color by adjusting the pH. allot to the National Arboretum , gloomy efflorescence will be produced in acidulent soil ( pH 5.5 and lower ) , and inert to alkaline soil ( pH 6.5 and higher ) will bring out pinkish bloom . If your soil ’s pH scale is between 5.5 and 6.5 , the hydrangea will bloom purple or have a mixing of blue and pink flush on the same works .
Step 5
clip about a third of the plant ’s old stems each winter to produce a fuller bush and remove frigid damage . You also can prune to reduce the plant ’s peak or to make out off dead flower heads .
concord to the National Arboretum , bigleaf and oakleaf hydrangeas , which flower on the old year ’s outgrowth , should be pruned within a month after florescence has ended . Panicle and smooth hydrangea blossom on this year ’s emergence , according to the National Arboretum , and can be snip any time from belated summer until other spring .
Step 6
Treat powdery mold by give your plant more light and better breeze circulation . Either cut back back Tree that are block the sunshine and plants that are crowd the plant , or transplant your hydrangea to a new location .
If your hydrangea is suffering from root rot , the stain is not draining decent . symptom include plants that look wilted but do n’t recover after being watered . you may attempt to amend the existing dirt or transplant your shrub .
Step 7
Fertilize hydrangeas in early spring with a top dressing of complete chondritic plant food at the rate of 2 lbs . per 100 straight feet , harmonize to the University of Rhode Island .
