When does Hydrangea Bloom Perfectly

When does hydrangea bloom? It is a common questions about growing hydrangea. As you know that some plants grow in certain season. So, how about hydrangea? Does it grow in certain season? Why do my hydrangeas not bloom? Also, can we control the color of hydrangeas? We will inform you about it here.

When does Hydrangeas Bloom?

When hydrangea blooms depends on the type, cultivar and also your planting zone. Usually, in early summer, most new growth hydrangeas put on buds to bloom in the following spring, summer and early fall season. If you live in hot climates, hydrangeas may stop blooming in the heat of summer. However, they will bloom again in the fall.

So, there is no exact date when hydrangeas can bloom. One of the reasons as we mentioned above is the type of hydrangea. There are five types of hydrangea in North America. Those are oakleaf, bigleaf (mophead and lacecap), smooth, panicle, and climbing. Each of these types has a different time of blooming. Mophead hydrangeas can bloom from late spring to midsummer in the southernmost  regions.

For panicle type, hydrangea can bloom from late spring to early summer. However, the blooms will stay on the plant until the winter’s chill drop them.

How about climbing hydrangeas? They will bloom from late spring until mid-summer. For oakleaf type, the will bloom from early summer in southern regions and from mid summer to early fall in the Midwest and northern states.

If hydrangeas are planted in warmer climates, they will be able to bloom earlier and even they can bloom longer than hydrangeas which are planted in northern climates.

Pruning also affect the hydrangea to bloom. If you prune some varieties of hydrangea in the spring, it can postpone them to bloom. If you do a hard pruning of smooth hydrangea in the late winter to early spring, it will be able to reduce the number of flowers. However, it can increase their size and postpone the bloom time of hydrangea.

Besides the reasons above, the other factors which affect the hydrangea flowering time are watering, sun exposure and also fertilizing.

The Reasons Why My Hydrangeas Not Blooming

If you have some hydrangea plants in your yard and then you find that they do not bloom, you may wonder. Do you make any mistakes in taking care of them? If it happens, it may disappointing. However, you actually do not need to be disappointed because there are several things that you are able to do to solve this problem.

If you find that your hydrangea plants do not bloom, it can happen because of the species of your hydrangea that you have planted. You need to know that some hydrangea types grow flowers off new wood and some grow flowers off old wood. If your hydrangeas do not bloom, you need to know the type of your hydrangea. Usually, hydrangeas which flower off of newly grown wood do not have any problem in blooming.

Some of the most common hydrangea plants come from the bigleaf family or Hydrangea macrophylla. They will produce beautiful blue or pink flowers. However, it is important for you to note that there are a lot of different cultivares which are created from this family of plants and a lot of them tend to die back to the base of the ground when cold winter happens.

If the existing wood or old wood of this type of hydrangea dies back to the ground, you will find that your hydrangea does not bloom when it grows back the following spring. It is because they are busy to grow new wood. In type of hydrangea, flowers will not form on newly grown wood. So, you have to note that the old stalks are places where the next year’s flowers will appear.

You have to make sure to protect your hydrangeas from frost and freezing temperatures in the winter to help them grow better in the summer.

Another factor of why your hydrangea still does not want to bloom is because you have pruned them back too far the year before. Sometimes, hydrangeas which do not bloom have been pruned in early summer and late winter. It makes them over pruned so that they will tend to die back more than normal. As a result, they will make you wait an entire year before they blossom again.

So, the solution for this problem is that you have to make sure that you prune your hydrangeas only in the early spring when you see the dead wood. If you find that your hydrangea does not bloom again, you need to know the type of your hydrangea and then note how far back it dies the year before.

You are able to test your soil as well if you find that your hydrangeas do not bloom. If you test it and then you find that the soil contains too much nitrogen, your hydrangea may have lush green growth and there is no flowers.

Same as the other flower plants, hydrangeas need phosphorus to bloom properly. So, you are able to add bone meal to increase phosphorus in the soil.

How to Control The Color of Hydrangea?

You may agree if we say that hydrangea is unique. It is because you are able to control the color of hydrangea. However, it is important for you to know that not all hydrangea types can be color adjustments. Bigleaf hydrangeas, H. macrophylla can react to changes in soil pH. If the soil pH is low, it permits hydrangeas to absorb aluminum which then it can turns the flowers to be a beautiful blue color. You are able to lower the soil pH to increase blue hydrangea flowers. You are able to do that by adding sulfur or peat moss in the soil. In addition, you are able to add additional aluminum sulfate to your soil during the growing season. If you add ground limestone to increase the pH, you will see that pink and red flowers shine.

If you test the soil pH, it can help you to adjust the color of your hydrangea. To avoid damage to the plant, make sure that you avoid the pH levels above 7.5.