Hydrangeas are adored by southern gardeners. There is a hydrangea variety and style for every location, whether it is large or little, pink or blue, bigleaf or panicle. Gardeners may start to question when it is too late to grow hydrangeas in the South as they anticipate the upcoming flowering season and decide what to put in the garden (and when!). Continue reading to learn the answer to that question, some recommendations for planting hydrangeas, and a few other tips to keep in mind so that the plants take root successfully and develop healthily in your garden.
First hydrangea planting advice? Before the first frost, sow your seeds. Hydrangeas do best when planted in the spring or fall since they thrive in more temperate climates than they do in extremely hot or cold ones. The Alabama Cooperative Extension System claims that “The optimal time to plant is in the fall because the plant has many months to develop a new root system before blooming. The next ideal planting time is early spring. If planting in the summer or for any new plants in a raised planting, more care should be taken to water them.”
It’s time to get your hands dirty after scheduling hydrangea planting on your calendar. According to the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, “The planting hole should only be as deep as the root ball of the plant and 2 feet broad. Instead of digging individual planting holes in dense soil, think about creating a planting bed. Compost should be added to any hydrangea planting to form a mound. This elevated planting enables greater root drainage.” In order to maintain your hydrangeas happy and healthy throughout the year, it’s crucial to keep them adequately watered in well-draining soil during colder months.
When should hydrangeas be planted?
Learning the fundamentals of how to plant hydrangeas can help you save time and money, just like with most other items in your garden. You’ll improve your chances of enjoying big, vibrant hydrangea flowers for years to come by picking the appropriate site, getting the soil just right, and planting correctly.
When should I plant hydrangeas?
The best time to grow hydrangeas is in the fall, followed by early spring. The goal is to provide the shrub lots of time to develop a strong root system before it blooms. Early in the day or late in the day are the ideal times to plant. The day’s cooler hours provide relief from heat exhaustion. Water new plants frequently until they get established.
Locations to plant hydrangeas
The first step is knowing where to grow hydrangea plants. Hydrangeas are frequently grown in beds adjacent to houses or fences. This is so because hydrangeas prefer the mild early sun to the hot afternoon sun. A protected area with sunny mornings and shaded afternoons is the ideal spot to plant hydrangeas. This is frequently found on the north or south side of a house. Avoid planting underneath trees since it could cause competition for nutrients and water. Flowers and leaves can both be destroyed by strong winds.
hydrangea-friendly soil
The soil needs to be rich in organic matter for hydrangeas to thrive. Drainage is important. Although hydrangeas prefer damp soil, they cannot stand standing water. Root rot can be brought on by wet, poorly draining soils. Your hydrangeas could pass away in a matter of weeks. Consider adding a lot of compost to your heavy soil before planting to increase the soil’s quality.
Methods for planting hydrangeas
Simply dig planting holes that are 2 feet wider than the root ball for planting hydrangeas. So that your plant lies level with or just higher than the surrounding soil, match the depth of the hole to the size of the root ball. You can improve water drainage away from the plant’s base by making a small mound.
The best way to grow hydrangeas
Simple propagation methods can multiply a single hydrangea into several more. The optimal time to layer bigleaf and panicle hydrangeas is in the early to mid-summer. You only need to:
- Close to your hydrangea plant, make a tiny trench.
- Bend a branch such that the middle of the branch meets the earth in the trench (six to 12 inches of branch should extend past the trench).
- Where the branch meets the trench soil, make scuff marks on the bark.
- After the trench is filled, cover it with a paver, brick, or stone.
- The branch can be transplanted to a different area once it has established its own root system over time.
Hydrangeas with smooth or oakleaf leaves produce new growth from underground stems. Simply separate the baby plant from the main plant by digging it up. After then, it can be moved to a new spot.
Can you grow hydrangeas in Tennessee?
In Tennessee, plants often begin to bloom in late May and continue into June. Aged blossoms continue until the fall, when they dry out but still look lovely. There are many varieties of bigleaf hydrangea that may be grown in zones 6 to 9, and they thrive best in damp but well-drained soil.
Where to plant hydrangeas:
- A location with morning sun and afternoon shade is ideal. They’ll take more sun if you reside further north (possibly full sun all day).
- Think about the mature size and give it lots of room to expand.
- Pick a location with great drainage. If necessary, add compost to the soil.
- Plants won’t thrive if they are planted too close to a tree because of root competition and a lack of sunshine.
- Planting should not be done in open locations where strong winds could snap stems.
How to plant hydrangeas:
- By amending your soil with up to 15% organic matter and an all-purpose slow-release fertilizer, you may give your plant a good start (use half of what is recommended).
- Plant a little higher than you did while you were in the nursery container.
- In order to give the roots plenty of freedom to expand, the planting hole should be two to three times broader than the root ball.
- Before planting, gently untie the roots from their pots.
- Add the modified dirt back in and thoroughly water it.
- Planting in groups requires a minimum distance of 3 feet (more, if planting larger varieties).
Planting hydrangeas in pots:
- Put potting soil in a bag rather than garden dirt.
- Slow-release fertilizer should be added.
- For watering, leave 1 to 2 inches between the soil’s top and the pot’s rim.
- Make sure the pot includes space for the plant to grow and drainage holes.
Can hydrangeas still be planted now?
VERY IMPORTANT: Pick a spot where your hydrangea will be able to grow to its full size without being pruned. For hydrangeas of average size, aim for a height of at least 4 ft. X 4 ft. It is nearly impossible to keep hydrangeas clipped to a size that is smaller than what they ultimately want to grow.
Plant in a soil that drains properly! Add roughage, such pine bark mulch, to heavy soil (make sure it’s ground BARK, not ground WOOD).
Avoid planting seeds too deeply. Plant at the same depth at which the hydrangea was potted.
When a hydrangea has lost all of its leaves and gone dormant, transplant it (late fall or winter).
Do hydrangeas like shade or the sun?
With the ideal balance of morning sun and afternoon shade, hydrangeas flourish. Even the sun-loving Hydrangea paniculata will thrive in some shade. Some hydrangea cultivars may survive complete shadow, though.
The oakleaf hydrangea, also known as hydrangea quercifolia, is a substantial species of hydrangea that may reach heights of up to eight feet. In a shade garden, this big bush makes a beautiful backdrop. The height will provide excellent midsummer seclusion. Oakleaf hydrangeas are summer bloomers with mostly white blooms, elegant oakleaf-shaped leaves, and lovely peeling bark.
Hydrangea anomala ssp. petiolaris is another choice for full shade. This climbing species, which has lacy, white blossoms in the summer, can reach a height of 50 feet if it is given adequate support. The foliage is a rich shade of green and would look wonderful growing up a tree trunk or covering the face of a building. It would also look lovely covering the roof of a garden shed.
Full shade cultivars require the same upkeep as partial shade. In the deeper shade, it will be especially crucial to keep the plants free of leaf litter and with excellent airflow. Water your plant once a week after it has become established. Keep a watch on the leaves, and if you notice any drooping, especially during the hot summer months, water them right away. The importance of this increases in hotter regions.
These leaves’ unique shape would be a lovely complement to Hosta leaves. The white blossoms would contrast nicely with the lighter hues of your shady blooms and provide some brilliant brightness to your shaded locations.
Shade Varieties
There are a few different hydrangea cultivars that thrive in the shade. Some types can even thrive in zones 3 (which doesn’t warm up until later in the spring), which is one of the coldest growing regions. Let’s examine some of the best shade selections!
Hydrangea quercifolia ‘Snow queen’
The movie “Snow queen” is stunning. The flowers are stunning, as they are with all hydrangeas. These rose blush-colored blossoms appear in the middle of summer. The foliage of this plant is my favorite component. The leaves begin the season in a very deep green, gradually changing to a deep reddish bronze color, and finally finishing in that shade, offering a stunning splash of color to your fall landscape.
Hydrangea quercifolia ‘Alice’
With a height ranging between 12 and 15 feet, this Oakleaf Hydrangea is one among the biggest. In the summer, this plant blooms with incredibly deep cream-colored flowers. A woodland garden would be a truly lovely place for “Alice.” This cultivar would look especially beautiful if it were grown as a bordering hedge.
Hydrangea arborescens ‘Annabelle’
‘Annabelle’ enjoys partial shade and has some of the largest flowers in the hydrangea family (12 inches wide!). These enormous blossoms can be supported all season long by the sturdy stalks. This shrub can grow up to five feet tall and five feet broad, so give it plenty of area to expand. These enormous, all-white blossoms bloom for a long time.
In a mass planting, as a specimen shrub, or as a foundation planting, “Annabelle” would look lovely. These bushes should still be included in your cutting garden. Imagine a bunch of flowers that large! Wow!
Can hydrangeas be planted in February?
The optimal time to transplant hydrangeas is right after the autumn dormancy of the plants. This indicates that all of the flowers have withered away and that most or all of the leaves have fallen.
- The optimum time to move hydrangea shrubs in colder locations is in November, when the bushes are dormant but the ground is not completely frozen.
- You can transplant hydrangeas in warmer regions where the ground doesn’t freeze between December and February.
While these are the ideal times to move hydrangea bushes, you may actually do so at any time of the year as long as it is not the hottest part of the year.
What kinds of hydrangeas are indigenous to Tennessee?
After the past two harsh winters, gardeners have found that their hydrangeas have had few or no blooms. Many people have questioned me about the second year in a row that they had a late bloom or no bloom at all. My lovely Endless Summer TM decided that September and October would be the perfect time to cover itself in blossoms, just in time for the first cold snap of the upcoming winter, so I wasn’t much better off.
While the recovery of hydrangeas after winter damage is the topic of this article, there may be other causes for an entirely green hydrangea. Nitrogen fertilizer in particular can result in excessive growth without any blooms. Even after a warmer winter, if your hydrangea hasn’t bloomed, you might want to lessen or switch out the fertilizer you’ve been using and get a soil test done.
Although hydrangeas appear to be very similar to the untrained eye, they actually fall into a number of different classifications. Some plants are fussier than others, and trimming them out of season will result in the loss of all blossoms for the following year. Some people put up with being mowed down to nothingness every few years. Winter damage is frequently Mother Nature’s pruning tool, and she can be harsh, unlike the meek pruning attempts of many gardeners. It’s possible that some gardeners made matters worse by removing the final flower buds when “tidying up.” Some hydrangeas can withstand winter damage and continue to bloom, albeit a little (or a lot) later and with possibly smaller flower heads.
Only “ancient” wood will allow some hydrangeas to blossom. That only refers to the stems and branches that have emerged in recent years. When you remove this old wood, you also remove the developing flower buds that formed inside of those stems during the summer. Early in the spring, a lot of people cut their hydrangeas under the mistaken assumption that all the brown wood they see is dead. The surviving stems can only produce new leaves because they do not yet contain the cells necessary to generate buds. Some hydrangeas, however, will produce flowers on both “old” and “new” wood. The new branches that begin to appear as springtime growth commences are fresh wood. Even if newer branches are unintentionally clipped at the incorrect time, blooms will still grow on them.
You won’t know when it is safe to prune or even whether you can skip pruning altogether if you don’t know what type you have. Let’s examine the four categories of hydrangea and discuss how to prune and take care of each of the lovely shrubs.
Oak Leaf Hydrangea: Being a true native of eastern Tennessee, this hydrangea is hardy and prefers more sunshine than any other. This hydrangea flourishes in drier, sunnier environments as opposed to other varieties. Because of its stunning fall leaf color and enormous bloom heads, it is my favorite. If it remains in moist soil for any period of time, it can quickly succumb to root rot and perish. They get their name from their leaf-like shape, which also makes them the most distinctive. Large flower heads with a somewhat rounded cone form, larger at the top and tapering to the end, are present on these plants. They are different from the others in that they favor drier, brighter circumstances. They retain their colored fall leaves for a while and can add some interest to the winter.
Known variously as the Bigleaf, French, or Garden hydrangea, Macrphylla (sometimes known as Mophead or Lacecap) is a kind of hydrangea. This category includes the traditional old-fashioned southern garden hydrangea, which has enormous, spherical or pompom-shaped flowers. They are known for having large flower heads, and these are typically the most colorful. These come in a wide range of well-liked types, and the Endless Summer series is one of them. To thrive more than the others, they require more water and shade.
Paniculata – These have the potential to grow extremely large, however they can be pruned into tree shape. The PeeGees and LimelightTM are the most well-known of these. Additionally, as opposed to large round balls, they frequently have flower heads that are somewhat cone-shaped and taper at the end.
Another natural variety, Hydrangea arborescens, is sometimes also called to as “Wild Hydrangea.” They may have formed a tall, blossoming hedge together in large bunches. The most popular variant offered is AnnabelleTM. To thrive and perform effectively in dappled sunlight, they need a little extra sun protection. They also have enormous, globular flower heads.
The first two hydrangea varieties we’ll talk about are those that primarily bloom on fresh wood and can survive a harsh winter without ceasing to bloom. They are also rather simple to maintain.
The arborescens is one of the hydrangeas that recovers from winter damage or the lax gardener the quickest. Any damage can be completely cut back to the ground, and immediately after, a new shrub with flowers will appear. If this is done regularly, it may become floppy from the weight of the blossoms, therefore it is better to leave some stems or restrict drastic pruning to once every three to four years to get a few that are bigger and stronger stems. If it receives a full morning of sun and then afternoon shade, it will grow more readily.
Once established, NativeOak Leafhydrangeas are among the hardiest hydrangeas. One in my area has endured county roadside trimming, gone from being in the shade behind a tree to being on its own in the full daylight, and continues to bloom despite the winter damage. This species favors warmer, drier weather than the others. Its weakness is that if it is in soil that remains damp for more than a few hours at a time, root rot can quickly destroy it. Timing is important when pruning them, and a harsh winter could harm the old stems, particularly at the crowns. To preserve buds that have already started to form, the greatest rule to follow is to never cut them back after August 1. Wait until a longer period of mild weather has encouraged buds to show before assessing severe winter damage; you’ll discover that many of the dead branches actually have buds. Before it fully displays new growth, you might need to wait until far into April. The wait seems longer the longer the winter is, but it will be worth it.
The next two types of hydrangeas will require a different pruning strategy.
The Paniculata Hydrangeas are the only ones that can nearly always be pruned and still produce some flowers. As long as you don’t prune right when flower buds are starting to bud, they will recover from winter damage and blossom pretty much on schedule. Don’t place them next to other plants or among themselves because they are typically the largest hydrangeas. You will be rewarded with enormous flower-covered shrubs year after year with a little afternoon shade and watering care during dry times.
The Lacecaps and Mophead kinds are highly well-liked by collectors and garden stores due to their widest range of colors and sizes. They don’t survive as well when cut by a gardener or mother nature in the winter because they aren’t as resilient as the native varieties. The Endless Summer series of hydrangeas, which are more modern everblooming varieties that also produce flowers on fresh wood, are the exception. In our region, older types cannot be pruned after August 1 in order to preserve the ancient wood buds. If you are patient enough, the Endless Summer varieties, like the oak leaf, will reward you with fresh growth buds. Waiting before doing a spring clean up on them is worth the unsightly sight of those brown sticks for both types.
After an exceptionally cold winter or one that continued into spring with numerous late damaging frost, all of the hydrangeas may stop blooming since the plants will have been ruined from the ground up. The only course of action in this situation is to encourage new plant growth while waiting for better conditions the next year, understanding that it won’t always occur in Tennessee. The most important lesson that us gardeners can take away is how valuable patience is. Next year is always an option!