My hydrangea never bloomed this year, and has started looking quite pitiful. It’s leaves are dying rapidly and it never really filled out this year. Here’s a picture:
Any idea what might be causing it and what I can do for it?
IANAH (I am not a horticulturist.)
What is the soil like? You could try some fertilizer and water. Yellow leaves means it needs calcium, try burying some crushed eggshells or bones near the roots. It does look sad, hopefully next year will be better.
Where do you live and what kind of hydrangea do you have?
I live in central Oklahoma. Unfortunately I have no idea what the soil is like or what kind of hydrangea it is. The previous owners did all the landscaping and I’ve just tried to keep it all alive!
Half of the bush blooms pink and the other half blue. Does that help at all?
Blue means the soil is acidic, pink means it’s alkaline, so if you want all blue you need to add some cow or horse manure around the bush. It looks as if it needs a good feed.
I had mine for a dozen or so years and I had to cut them way back each year. I know mine were always in very good shape but I live in so cal on the coast. I used a time release type fertilizer throughtout all my beds once yearly.
You may have two bushes growing from the same root ball, not uncommon. Both colors are common.Was it a hot summer? Did it lose some shade? It looks to me like it needs more water and less sun. How long has it been in that spot?
First thing I’d do is check on the condition of the soil under that mulch. Too dry? Too wet? (plants can wilt due to excess moisture as well as a lack of it). You could dig it up and check on the root ball. On occasion someone plants a shrub or tree and doesn’t bother removing the container - eventually the plant suffers for it. Maybe something has been chewing on the roots - look for signs of pests.
What I would not do is fertilize it. Insufficient fertility is not a cause of severe wilt. You don’t want to stress the hydrangea further by trying to push it into growth - solve the cultural problem first.
There could be some kind of fungal or bacterial hydrangea plague in Oklahoma of which I’m unaware. You could bring a photo of the plant and a couple leaf samples in to a knowledgeable person at a good garden center.
Weedkiller?
Pre-emergence chemicals?
Soggy soil?
Upgrading the suggestion from Jackmannii: take samples and photos to your local master gardeners:
http://mastergardener.okstate.edu/
They’re trained to help. Most garden center employees are … well, trained on the register, and they might be able to tell a tomato plant from a petunia, but in my personal experience, not much more than that, usually. There are exceptions, to be sure, but they’re still there to give recommendations on what new plants to buy, not to troubleshoot what’s wrong with your existing plants.
Did you prune heavily in the spring? Some hydrangea spp bloom only on old wood. Pruning in general is done right after blooming.
Thanks folks, I’ll go to a local gardening center to see if they can help. The plant has been in the same spot for at least 6 years. Our summer wasn’t as horrible as normal, and it’s survived some pretty bad summers!
To check root damage, is it okay to dig around it to look or will I risk damaging it further?
In other news … you lucky bastard … I deliberately tried to get my hydrangea to do that, adding acid compost and aluminum sulfate to one side for blue, adding lime to the other side for pink. Never really worked. I had seen this happen accidentally 'tho. That is, a blue hydrangea with some pink flowers, often, the pink flowers are close to a crumbling wall or buried cement. Is that the case?
I have no idea how it happened and can take no credit for it. Whoever planted the flower bed was an experienced gardner! When it normally blooms, the flowers on the left are blue, the flowers on the right are pink, and a couple of flowers in the middle of the bush are half pink and half blue. No idea how they got that one to work…
I live in South Fla is there any hope of growing hydrangea here ?
?
Can’t provide a cite, some miscellaneous bit of news somewhere, but I remember the article said that due to the extreme cold last year many hydrangeas wouldn’t bloom this year and may be a bit puny next year. I’ve never grown them, but the top half of my Lauder Walking Stick produced no leaves at all this year.
At a minimum, you need to look under the mulch to see what the soil moisture situation is. I’d start there.