Hydrangeas are one of the most popular of all garden shrubs with very showy flowers and large attractive leaves. The fact that they are so very easy to grow, adaptable to most soil and garden situations, makes them the ideal choice for inclusion in a shrub bed or border. They can also be featured as a stand-alone specimen in the middle of a lawn bed. Hydrangeas also make good container plants. There is also a good climbing version of the Hydrangea family.
Hydrangea Blue Dreamstime
Another point in the favour of all Hydrangeas is that they all have reasonable autumn foliage colour – heightened by the fact that most have large leaves.
Then to take us through the winter, there are superb seedheads – about the same size as the preceding flowers – which will last through until spring. The Mophead Hydrangeas have a better show in this respect. Many a Christmas display is set off with an arrangement of metallic sprayed seedheads.
Florists also make good use of Hydrangeas as potted houseplants. These are the same as the garden hydrangeas, but grown differently. After use indoors, they can be planted out in the garden or outside container.
The ease of growing Hydrangeas is highlighted by the rarity of help questions my mailbox. It is one of the easiest and rewarding of shrub with very few problems. The main question I get for help advice, is how to turn the flowers blue!
Hydrangeas can be conveniently split into a few groups – all of the plants in each group being happy with the same cultural requirements – One size fits all – almost!