How to Maintain Your Hydrangeas
If you’re looking to add lush, gorgeous clouds of color to your garden, hydrangea shrubs are the perfect option! Their beautiful mophead blooms are stunning and come in a wide variety of colors, set against a backdrop of lush foliage that is irresistible; you’ll have no problem finding a variety that suits your aesthetic!
Hydrangeas are fantastic options for filling out a garden bed, adding privacy, or planting beneath shade trees. Whether you plan to install hydrangeas this year, or if you have a few in your yard that need some love, this guide to maintaining hydrangeas will help you get started.
Our Favorite Hydrangea Variety for 2022: The Newport Hydrangea
This showy-rebloomer has gorgeous mophead flowers that change color based on the acidity of your soil. You can change it to a gorgeous blue-violet by adding aluminum sulfate to lower the pH of your soil, or here in Southern California, our higher pH will naturally bring beautiful deep-pink blooms.
The Newport hydrangea is suitable for containers, small gardens, or planting in groups, making it a diverse option for your garden! It blooms in the spring and is an excellent choice if you’re looking for fresh cuts to make arrangements. For the best results from your Newport hydrangeas, deadhead spent blooms and prune weak stems as needed—this will ensure that your plant is putting all of its energy into healthy growth!
Making a Happy Home for Your Hydrangea
Well-draining soil is essential for a happy hydrangea; they like moist soil, but don’t want to sit in continually wet soil. We recommend adding mulch around your plant to conserve water and keep the root system cool in the summer heat.
During your plant’s first season, water deeply and regularly so that it can establish; after that, you can water as needed to maintain moist soil. Water early in the morning so that your hydrangea has time to absorb the moisture before the midday heat!
Hydrangeas generally don’t prefer direct sunlight and need some shade during the day. Plant your hydrangeas in a partially shaded area or in a spot where they’ll get morning sun and afternoon shade. Overall, they should get no more than a couple of hours of direct sunlight per day; they won’t produce as many flowers if they get too much shade.
Feed your hydrangeas with an organic fertilizer in the early spring to get a good start on the growing season. We recommend using our Organic Acid Fertilizer if you want violet blooms on your Newport hydrangea or our Organic Rose & Flower Fertilizer if you prefer to keep your soil as is for pink blooms.
How to Prune Your Hydrangea
Different hydrangeas may have different pruning requirements, so do your research before you grab your pruning shears! The Newport hydrangea will grow best with deadheading throughout the growing season; it produces buds for the following year in the mid-summer and fall, so don’t prune it back in the spring, or you’ll lose all of your new buds!
Troubleshooting Hydrangea Growth
There are a few problems you may run into while growing your hydrangea, but you can fix most of them with simple adjustments:
- No Flowers: double-check when your hydrangea variety needs pruning. You may be cutting back at the wrong time of year, which will remove buds essential for growth and new blooms.
- Drooping Leaves: hydrangeas need consistent moisture, so you’ll need to make sure they have enough water during the particularly hot months. If the leaves are drooping, your hydrangea is thirsty.
- Brown Leaf Edges: Take it easy with the fertilizer and aluminum sulfate; your plant is getting burned from too much product. Flush the soil to rinse away the excess products, let the soil dry, and then resume your watering regimen. Your hydrangea only needs fertilizer and soil amendments once or twice a year, so make sure you give it some time to recover before adding any fertilizer again.
If you think a Newport hydrangea would be an excellent addition to your landscape this summer, visit us at Roger’s Gardens! We would be happy to provide more information and products for hydrangea maintenance.
For more information, view our videos: Blooming Hydrangeas with Sarah Smith.