Hydrangeas.

gayle89786 · 29 January

Hello. Last year I did not get One hydrangea. I cut the them back early spring, and fed them well and watered, I got lots of green foulage but no Flowers. Any advise

Fairygirl · 29 January

Depends on the type of hydrangea as to pruning time - do you know what type you have @gayle89786?
If you can offer more info re the age of the shrub and how it's planted etc, that will also help with advice. Sometimes, excess food will produce foliage at the expense of flowers too, so the type of food may be a factor as well

Plantminded · 29 January

It sounds like your Hydrangea is a variety that flowers on the previous year’s wood. Leave it unpruned this year, just remove the old flower heads in future above the first set of buds below. I have made that mistake in the past!

Robert West · 29 January

To be fair, I had one hydrangea that I pruned the same as I always do. Had three flowers. There's normally 20+. Must have just had a bad year. Maybe the drought the previous year affected it??

Fairygirl · 30 January

That's a good point @Robert West. Often, problems aren't apparent until much later too.
The other thing that affects them is harsh weather after pruning, which then affects the new growth, and therefore the developing flower buds. I had that problem last year with a couple of mine. It's usually fairly safe to prune in April here, but we had a few frosts in early May, which just knocked them back, so that was that.
I'm just leaving them this year!

Plantminded · 30 January

Weather, soil conditions and some pests and diseases can affect flowering but if a variety of Hydrangea macrophylla is hard pruned in early Spring it won't flower that year. I had this problem a couple of years ago and you kindly solved it for me @Fairygirl, with that pruning advice - last year it flowered the best ever 😊! I prune my H. paniculatas in early Spring and flowering is unaffected as they flower on new wood.

Hydrangeas.

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