Get your climbing hydrangeas ready for flowering season with this quick task (Image: Getty) This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more
Hydrangeas are a popular plant for gardeners to grow and decorate their gardens with, but not every garden is suitable for these plants. If you’re keen to add a hydrangea to your collection, gardening expert and TikTok creator Ish revealed that a climbing hydrangea can work in any garden.
These plants take a while to establish, but you can prepare the climber to grow bountiful blooms. If you’ve already got a climbing hydrangea in your garden, you can expect them to flower between June and August. Typically, these plants require a serious prune in late summer, as this allows enough time for the flowers to grow fully come the next season.
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Don’t do a full prune, just trim away any leftover flowers to make space for the new buds (Image: Getty)
However, Ish suggested that established climbers could benefit from a small snip reading for the next growing season. With his plant starting to bud, the expert recommends trimming off any spent flowers left over from last year.
Trim the stem about an inch above any of the new buds. This will help direct energy to the new flowers, rather than the old.
It’s really that simple. You won’t need to give the plant a full prune just yet, simply trim any leftover flowers to make way for new buds.
In fact, gardening experts recommend pruning only in the later summer months after they have flowered. So don’t be tempted to give these plants a serious prune, as this will be counterproductive.
Gardeners’ World warned that if your climbing hydrangea has grown too large, you’ll likely have to sacrifice the flowers “for a few years”. To get the plant back in shape, the hydrangeas will need to be given a harder prune in autumn or spring.
If you’re struggling to grow flowers on a mature plant could be due to incorrect pruning. Gardeners World explained: “Climbing hydrangeas produce flowers on last year’s shoots, so in order for the plant to have enough time to develop flowering wood for the next year, prune in summer straight after flowering. Don’t cut the plant back too much.”
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The Royal Horticultural Society agreed that a routine prune of climbing hydrangeas should be done in summer after flowering, as this will give the plant enough time to develop flowers. The RHS advised to prune back the flowered shoot and shorten any “overlong new growth”.
As most flowers grow at the top of the plant, these should be left alone as much as possible or lightly trimmed, according to the RHS. It also pointed out that more established plants will be able to tolerate a hard pruning in spring.
When positioning your climbing hydrangeas, Ish explained that they can be happily placed in a shady spot in the garden. To keep it nourished, climbing hydrangeas can be planted in clay soil or a free-draining soil.
Ish said: “Whilst it takes about two or three years to really establish, once it does, it grows like absolute wildfire. And as you can see, I’ve got a nice thick stem here, and it’s not like climbers where they’ll kind of go brown and not grow anymore, you’ll see I’ll get continuous new growth.
“So if you’re looking for something quite full and vibrant all year round, or until winter, I guess, get yourself a climbing hydrangea.”
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