HELP A DEAD HYDRANGEA
christiewilkinson91
Posts: 2
in Plants
Hi I planted this Hydrangea 3 weeks ago. I have watered it every day and it gets sun in the morning and shade in the afternoon. I have also fed it plant food every week. I planted it in quite dry soil but immediately soaked it. Should I have put compost in? I am very new to this gardening malarkey. Please help if anyone knows how to rescue this!!!
Last edited: 12 August 2017 15:24:37
0
Posts
Most Hydrangeas thrive in dappled shade , moist slightly acidic conditions and plenty of rainwater . If you live in a hard water area this will probably do more harm than good .
If it was mine , I would look at the main stems and cut back to at least the first or second green shoots from the base of the plant ; this sounds awfully drastic , but it's to conserve moisture .
Looking at the photo , it's beyond rescuing , but not beyond saving .
Too many flowers for such a small shrub. I too would cut it right down to the first or second green shoot. The flowers are finished and of no good to the plant. I would imagine that perhaps it should have stayed in the container that you bought it in until the flowers had finished (and then cut it as suggested). Hind sight is a wonderful thing, and we all make gardening mistakes, with plants dying for no apparent reason. However I am sure with all the sound advice you have received christiewilkinson, you may be able to save the plant, which incidentally will be dormant in the winter.
As GD2 says , there's probably not a gardener/plantsperson alive who hasn't made dreadful mistakes ; gardening and general plant cultivation is a learning curve .
Don't be put off by any errors you might make !
PS I've been growing a vast range of indoor/outdoor plants for nearly forty-years , and still have no interest or knowledge of vegetable growing ; purely ornamental (not me , the plants)
I would cut it down as well, and defining don't feed it, the worse thing is to feed a sick plant, that will promote growth which it shouldnt be doing this time of the year, feed it in Spring, and give a nice lot of mulch for the winter.
Edited to add: it's much too close to the wall, they grow about six feet in all directions, and the wall will shelter the rain off of it.
Last edited: 12 August 2017 17:58:42
I suspect these plants from the garden centre/supermarkets have been grown indoors, earlier ones sold in this year were forced. They have been fed too much and I have seen many with similar problems when they get planted out. They have been mollycoddled and not able to deal with the sudden outdoor environment. The flowers are over-abundant and leaves soft and weak. I would suggest putting a lot of bulky bark mulch around the base to control wet soil splashing back as the soil may be too heavy and wet around the top. Snip off all the flowers. They will need to be eased into the outdoors.
Thank you everyone for your helpful responses. It is much appreciated! I will attempt to save it tomorrow!! Thank you again
:)