Hydrangeas Battle Back from Rough Winter

Hydrangea in Harwich is normally exploding with blue flowers by now.

Those ubiquitous giant blue flowers that line fences and nestle at the foundations of Cape Cod homes are in hiding this summer, struggling to provide any sort of display after last winter's extreme cold temperatures.  

"You should see Shore Road in Chatham" says David Chalker of Bartlett Tree Service, speaking of the renowned collection of hydrangeas featured in some of Cape Cod's most esteemed properties.  "They're decimated".

Unlike many flowers which die back completely in the fall, hibernate beneath the ground and send up new stalks and new blooms each year, hydrangea blossoms appear on the stalks from last summer's growth.  What appear to be dead, dry sticks are actually flower buds ready to wake up and be spectacular.  New blossoms sprout from nodes on those sticks.  





Because temperatures were unusually cold this year, many of the stalks-- and this year's bloom, did not survive, according to Chalker.

---

Chatham bore the brunt of Cape Cod's winter last year.  One of the few Cape communities that exists in a U.S.D.A zone 7b, indicating average minimum temperatures between 5 and 10 degrees, the pretty little village at the elbow of the Cape received the most snowfall with 50" as storm after storm brushed Nantucket Sound.  

The remainder of the Cape is a zone 7b, meaning the average minimum temperature is between 0 to 5 degrees.  By contrast, areas in the Berkshires are a zone 5a.  They can bottom out at minus 20 to minus 15.  You don't see hydrangeas over there. 

Chalker says the hydrangeas will pull through, but this year's bloom will be paltry.  If you still see sticks growing from your bushy green leaves, simply cut the sticks off at the base.  Barring another ferocious winter, all that thick growth filling in will host wonderful gigantic blue flowers next year at this time.  

Here's hoping next year it's back to business with the big blue flowers.