Re: hydrangeas and zones

Kay,

I think tidy people keep their hydrangeas pruned, and people who are
growing them as separate shrubs.  On my old plants, the branches get
really high.  If the plant was out on its own, it would look terribly
scrawny ,but they are planted really close to other shrubs like huge
rhododendrons, and they weave their way through them.  This helps
ensure that I get some bloom on the old plants.  The new ones that
I've had only four or five years are still too short to hide
themselves in a rhodo, and even though they are swathed in chicken
wire, somehow the deer still manage to eat most of them, and I don't
get any flowers.  Deer will go to great lengths for a munch of
hydrangea.

Regarding hardiness:  when I suggested keeping yours low, I was
thinking of your being able to cover them during the winter, with
evergreen boughs or bushel baskets or something.  However, having a
heap of compost and evergreen boughs over the bottom part, will leave
the top part of the branches to live or die depending on the severity
of the winter, and that is the case here as well.  And then in the
spring you might find buds coming on the unprotected branches, but if
not, there should be some new growth from the lower, protected part.
Some people like to cut their flowers to dry for winter bouquets -
they go the most marvellous colours -but other people say one should
leave the old dead flowerheads on to protect the buds for next year.

The hybrids flower first from the terminal bud which probably
wouldn't survive the winter for you.  They also flower later on side
buds, and these are the ones that you would have.

Diane Whitehead
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