Blue Hydrangea

Hi Again

A few months back I replaced the 2 small potted conifers I had either side of my door (they were turning brown, suspect wind burnt?), anyway I replaced them with 2 small'ish Blue Hydrangeas. They look lovely even if they do need watering every other night in the dry spells, but I believe I need to keep them feed with a special liquid feed to keep them blue, is this something a garden centre would sell or can I make it up myself. I'm already sure some of the new blooms are starting to turn more purple than the deep blue of the original flower balls?

Any assistance would be much appreciated

Regards
John

 

I can't remember which is which but one colour is alkaline soil and the other is acidic soil I think

 

There are liquid and powder feeds at the garden centers for keeping Hydrangeas blue, they are the most practical way to do it, and they are not especially expensive.Planting them in acidic ground is also helpful. If the water from the tap is very chalky you may need to "blue" them somewhat more often else feeding them the bluing stuff once or twice a year (in early and mid spring) should be enough.

 

Stick a few off cuts of copper pipe in the tub or water every now and then with a copper sulphate solution.

 

From memory: to get the blue colour the plant needs aluminium, and the chemical that can be watered on is aluminium sulphate. It's true that an acidic soil helps, because in an acid soil aluminium is soluble. In an alkaline soil aluminium is insoluble and not available to the plant.

 

Ivory and Pro-

I`ve been here with you two before, whether its copper or aluminium that does this. Which is it?

I have buried a couple of crushed (someone elses of course) Cider cans under the roots of the purple one I got earlier and its gone purple again.

 

So is it blue for acid and red for alkaline or tuther way around....A cottage down the lane had one bush which was red on one side and blue on the other....Looked lovely though.:thumb:

 

I've found ths page really useful http://www.hydrangeashydrangeas.com/colorchange.html although last year, it wasn't quite as blue as I'd like, so I've upped the dose according to the commercial document linked to from that page, so fingers crossed, that should do it.

 

My science teacher used to say - aciD - reD, (or pink) aLkaLi - bLue; if that's any help!! Funny what you remember from school (so long ago.....!) Lindy.

 

Well according to that link daisybelle posted, its the other way around....I know, beats me as well, but thar ya go.

 

In the world of hydrangeas acid definitely = blue, and alkaline = red.
But the ph alone does not guarantee the blue colour you also need aluminium in the ground. Pure peat or bark has next to none, so you need to add that throgh appropriate feeding, especially to potted plants. As easy as that,

 

I had a good read of that web site, hydrangeahydrangea.com and it seems fairly clear now, since i've got them in pots i'll just add a little aluminium sulphate 1-or-2 times a year and hope for the best.