Surprising Winter Planting: Hydrangeas at the Chicken Coop!

It may be close to Christmas, but I am planting hydrangeas at the chicken coop in December! This is a great time to add these gorgeous garden staples to the chicken coop gardens as they will have plenty of time to get established before the summer heat hits.

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Hey friends welcome to Gardening with Creekside  today we are up at the chicken coop you can   probably hear the girl singing her song it’s  called The Egg song So when a chicken lays her   egg she’s very proud of herself and so she sings  her song so she just started singing right when  

I started filming so there you go but we are  up at the chicken coop we are going to plant   two different kinds of hydranges today and a  butterfly bush yes it is about a week away from   Christmas and that is the beautiful thing about  living in the South and living in North Carolina  

Is that I can continue to plant lots and lots  of plants in the winter time it is fabulous in   fact this is the perfect time um to be planting  those trees and shrubs in the ground because uh   these plants can get their Roots really well  established before the heat of the summer hits  

Here in the South I’m in North Carolina a Zone  8A uh recently moved from a 7B now to an 8A and   um we’re not concerned about how really cold our  Winters are because relatively speaking they are  

Very very mild but what we have to be concerned  about is the Heat and the humidity of the summer   really like into like mid July till really gosh  even sometimes mid September that is when we have  

Our most intense heat and humidity and that is  when our plants really struggle so we try to get   their Roots really well established be before  they are put under stress this is that time to   do it temperatures are cool the uh ground though  is still relatively warm and we’re getting more  

Consistent rain so that I don’t have to worry  about coming out here and watering on such a a   consistent basis as I would have to do if I were  planting these exact same plants in May June or  

July so what we are going to do today is uh let  me give you a little rundown here we are like   I said of course obviously at the chicken Co the  girls are quite happy they got some uh pumpkins we  

Still have leftover pumpkins from Thanksgiving so  they are uh munching on those the two hydrangeas   that we’re going to plant today if you remember  uh back in the summer and I want to say this  

Was July we planted um three puffer fish so they  were in one two and three when we planted those   they were gorgeous they were in full bloom they  were stunning and I fell into the Trap as most  

Gardeners do you go to the Garden Center I was  at our garden center we had just gotten some new   puffer fish in and they were absolutely Beyond  gorgeous full of blooms and I was like oh I’m  

Going to plant them up the chicken coop remember  how I told you we need to worry about the stress   of the Heat and the humidity of the summer as  opposed to the cold of the winter well guess  

What two of them died yeah so one went downhill  really fast and one was doing great and then after   a month she just kind of gave up the ghost I have  no idea then you have one right here man she did  

Great the whole time and just kept going strong  and did wonderful so that’s gardening folks right   so what we’re going to do today is we are going  to because I still have the one puffer fish here  

On the left I have another puffer fish right here  so we’re going to replace the um puffer fish that   was there with another puffer fish puffer fish  of course are one of the newest introductions   from Proven Winners a beautiful panicle that when  it’s in full bloom it almost covers the entire  

Plant think of it of like a bobo on steroids  it’s going to be Hardy in zones 3 to8 it is   going to be in that 3 foot to 5 foot Mark which  will be perfect because the two puffer fish are  

Going to frame frame the new Pinky Winky Prime  here in the center now Pinky Winky Prime I have   never grown a Pinky Winky so this is Prime in the  fact of it is still going to be nice and large 6  

To9 feet tall and wide still Hardy in zones 3 to8  it is going to have um more um it’s going to be a   little bit more floriferous right so it’s going  to have more flowers on it it is going to have  

A a pure white really pointed cone shaped flowers  that will turn a more intense pink and red now if   you are a fellow Southern Gardener like I am you  know that sometimes we struggle with our panicles  

Getting that pink color it is nothing that we are  doing it is simply our climate uh the hydrangeas   the panicle hydranges need the cooler nights to  turn that beautiful Rosy pink and red we were in   Michigan um gosh it was last year in September  or October I have never seen panicle hydrangeas  

That color we were able to take the tour of tour  the the private Gardens at Spring Meadow Nursery   the hydrangeas were Beyond gorgeous and that is  just the that’s the thing that I have to accept   as a North Carol North Carolinian Gardener is  that I can plant in December but my hydranges  

Are not going to have the color as my friends  in Michigan and that’s okay um but if you are   in those areas of the country or your climate  or your elevation where you get uh cooler drier  

Nights nice and warm during the day and then it  cools down dramatically then you’re going to get   that beautiful coloration in the South it just may  not happen especially where we are so that is what  

We’re going to do um is going to blend in quite  nicely because remember right behind here is what   I affectionally call hydrangea Hill so we’ve got  remember we were just here with Mimi last week and  

We pruned those are fire light hydranges and then  way down at the bottom we have limelights so we’re   going to have four different panicle hydrangeas  right here very close to each other which is going  

To be really fun next we are going to plant one of  my all-time favorite butterfly bushes I love this   butterfly bush even though you look at it right  now and you’re like Jenny oh my gosh she is so  

Sad looking well this is pug Pinker and pugster  Pinker is just a phenomenal petite butterfly   bush it we have it in mass in the Privacy berm it  has beautiful really deep rich pink flowers there   was a pugster pink they came out with Pinker  because you know why yep it has deeper Pinker  

Blooms pugster Pinker is going to be in for us a  very much of a 3X3 bush right a shrub and so it   is going to be what I call here we call them semi  Evergreens because basically they’re going to keep  

This type of foliage all winter long you can see  where we had um lots and lots of old blooms right   but we are still holding on to some green growth  obviously it is not as full and as lushy as it  

Is in the summertime but pretty much this is how  our butterfly bushes look all winter long so I’m   going to plant it here where the mahogany Splendor  habiscus was the mahogany Splender is a beautiful  

Annual that we Ed for foliage but I really want  to put it right here because it is going to be   surrounded I’ve got a blue Fortune agacki right  here which those two blooming together would be  

Gorgeous I have a double Eternal white Quint over  there um so yeah so just lots of little areas and   of course behind it is the uh Nelly Stevens Holly  which it will complement off of very very nice so  

Basically what I’m going to do is I have um all  of my supplies I’m going I’ve got my power planner   augur with the 9 in drill with a heavy duty  tip I am going to need that heavy duty tip on  

This thick red clay so I have that and I have my  biotone so what I’m going to do is just go ahead   and uh get these babies in the ground set up the  camera I will film that show you all about that  

And then once I’m done I’ll come back to you  and kind of explain um you know how we plant   butterfly bushes how we plant hydranges and then  I’m going to show you a couple little things that   Brena and I got accomplished before we started  this video so it’s just been a great beautiful  

Sunny cool day in the garden uh this is kind of  the day I love just p in the garden that’s what   Mimi and I say we’re just going to go P that just  means we’re going to do a little bit of this we’re  

Going to be doing a little bit of that over here  and over there just getting a lots of odds ends   just kind of caught up and accomplished  so let’s get these babies in the ground  all right my friends today’s project is complete  you know some days in the garden you get projects  

Done really quick and sometimes it just goes on  forever very impressed with myself I got this done   in uh under 45 minutes while filming so hey we are  doing pretty darn good today I feel great about  

Getting these plants in the ground I still have  a whole section of plants we’ll look at those in   just a minute that need to go into these Gardens  but this Garden just kind of keeps getting pushed  

To the back burner uh and and that’s okay right A  lot of times in life well always in life you have   to prioritize things so this is kind of becoming  a lower priority with the other things going on  

Uh here at the nursery where there’s a signature  Garden or the production house right but it feels   great to get these done let me just walk you  through real quick uh you saw me plant we’re  

Going to kind of go in reverse last I planted the  pugster butterfly bush now I think you could see   on when I planted it that I planted it pretty what  we call High meaning that my root ball is sticking  

Above the ground butterfly bushes hate to have wet  feet so you want to give them plenty of room right   here to drain well I have thick red clay soil so  when it is wet it holds the moisture that is the  

Best way to kill a butterfly bush is to put  it in too wet of a condition also there’s no   compost around this butterfly bush they like to be  neglected yes I use biotone because we want strong  

Healthy Roots but really I just uh took the native  soil pushed it back I had some mulch brought it   back we are going to REM mulch this whole bed uh  at some later time this winter so we’ll take care  

Of that again but just know with your butterfly  bushes especially if you lose one if you’re in   the south you lose one in the wintertime it’s not  because it’s too cold it’s because it was too wet  

You probably planted it too deep or it’s just in  a wet spot and it rotted so plant your butterfly   bushes High don’t use compost and leave them alone  they love of course that full full hot sun and do  

Great maintenance on your pugster butterfly bush  I have learned kind of quote the hard way not to   prune my butterfly bushes until I get consistent  warm temperatures so for me that would be uh like   late March uh that I can then go ahead and trim  them back because all of your butterfly bushes  

Bloom on New Growth that means they need to be  pruned at least once a year best time to do is   coming out of winter going into spring once you  have consistently warm temperatures you start   to see some new growth and then you can give  it a haircut with pugster I don’t prune them  

That much because they only get be 3 ft tall um  so I’ll cut it back maybe by a half that’s kind   of a good general rule with any kind of shrub  that you’re going to go ahead and prune so give  

It a prune byy half if you want to fertilize  it they don’t really need a lot of fertilizer   if you want to give them a little something you  could probably give them a little plant tone but  

I don’t but I don’t fertilize my butterfly bushes  because they are very hands-off and very uh fine   next we went ahead and in Reverse we planted  the the Pinky Winky Prime now right where Brena  

Is standing is that Pinky Winky Prime so we got  Pinky Winky Prime and then we have of course the   um puffer fish those you can plant a little bit  deeper as far as not deep when I say deeper I’m  

Just talking about that butterfly bush and so that  they are not um really sticking above the ground   right um this one is raised up just a little bit  but it is fine and lots of compost around these  

Of course everybody got biotone and um I did go  ahead and give it a little bit of water because   this area was dry we’re going to we’re expected to  get like 2 inches of rain uh in two days so they  

Will be good to go until then with your Pentacle  hydranges they too Bloom on New Growth and you   are going to want to prune them by no more than a  half as a general rule we say a third to a fourth  

Now Pinky Winky Prime has already been pruned I  will will come back and just Shape Up puffer fish   just a little bit the reason that we don’t prune  them is because we want to have really strong  

Thick sturdy stems um so you can see now these are  this is a young plant right but you see that now   let’s go over here to a a semimature fire light  right same type of same family um of a hydrangea  

And look how strong and thick those this trunk is  Right we’ve got really really strong strong stems   this is going to give my plant support it is not  going to get floppy so you can see that we don’t  

Prune it way far down every year we just prune it  a little bit more so it was initially pruned here   and then you can come up and see that this then  the next time we pruned it here then we pruned it  

Here and now I’m pruning it here and as every  year goes by each additional stem is going to   get nice and thick and sturdy and hold up those  beautiful panicle flowers for us so that is just  

A little tip because when people say you know my  Pentacles they’re so floppy I can’t stand it it   may be that you’re pruning too much or if you’re  not pruning at all then that is um you know you’ve  

Got to prune them at least once a year and um  again late winter going into spring now you could   say would any you’ve already pruned yours yes I  did Pentacles are a little bit more forgiving um  

And I know that for us as far as because we have  this wedding coming up in the spring I know how   springs are for us with production and the retail  Garden Center it is just a mad house around here  

So I am getting all these little chores done that  I can do now I’m getting them done now speaking   of little chores now that we’ve covered about  what we did today um we also before we started  

Filming Bren and I had lots of fun we went around  and got two uh bird feeders hung up found these   gorgeous Ral iron hooks off of etsy so I got a  couple of these but here we have um a SE feeder  

My birds do love SE feeders so we have that and  then over here I have a um a squirrel prooof uh   bird feeder because the squirrels are a problem  for us not only are the squirrels a problem but  

Raccoons are a problem they will come and tiptoe  across those hooks and destroy my feeders so I   try to Raccoon and squirrel proof these this is a  droll Yankee I love this one it has tons of food  

In it but the hint like the little perches are  spring-loaded so it won’t hold the weight of a   squirrel very very effective and then I just  use the black o sunflower seed in there with  

Some like thistle or the ner ner Niger whatever uh  for the finches mix that together and they love it   now you’ll notice that I still have some plants  here we talked about that I have a collection of  

Plants that need to go into the ground if you  were like me I think all gardeners probably   if you Garden long enough you’re going to have  a little collection of plants that are waiting   to be planted and waiting to be like find their  permanent home these are all going to go in the  

Gardens up here I just need uh Jerry’s help one  clearing out some of the Woodland area and then   two honestly I’m going to have him help me with  the um yeah so I just need some help and so what  

I’m going to do until then is put all your pots  together just hook them up you know snuggle them   everybody in nice and close to each other that  way when the wind blows like the storm that’s   going to come through in two days we’re supposed  to have high winds keeps everybody upright they  

Support one another and it helps insulate them  I know it may sound silly but just putting those   pots together like that really does help insulate  them we do this on the production shrub lot and   it does make a big difference so just snuggle  everybody up together and then last but not  

Least what we did is we went ahead and planted  a Climbing Hydrangea so this is a what we call   just a non-branded hydrangea so it’s not it’s not  it doesn’t belong to a specific brand it’s not a  

Proven one it’s not a Monrovia it’s not a Southern  Living it’s in a black pot just a classic Climbing   Hydrangea and I’ve had it sitting here for a  couple of months and so she finally got into  

The ground today even though she was in the pot  for a couple of months you can see that she is   very happy and very alive she’s got a little  bit of green little buds on her but climbing  

Hydranges you want to plant them next to a large  support this is is an oak tree that is back here   kind of in that back section of the garden and  so the climbing hydranges are going to be your  

Part sun part shade now here in the winter time  she is getting a lot of sun that’s okay because   Summer Sun is a lot weaker than winter sun is  a lot weaker than Summer Sun I don’t know if I  

Said that right so what I’m concerned about is  not my winter sun I’m concerned about my summer   sun here once all these Hardwoods Leaf out in the  summertime she will get um nice beautiful dappled  

Sun but she will get a break in the afternoon so  right here will do great I had her sitting here   in those hotter months and she did absolutely  great um but climbing hyres notoriously slow to  

Get started they will sit for a couple of years  they’ll have some growth um but not a ton and   then once they start growing oh my goodness they  absolutely take off they can get like 40 to 50  

Ft tall so this is why you want to put it next  to something that’s going to be there for quite   a while hence an oak tree and so they have this  beautiful kind of relationship where the hydrangea  

Will attach itself to the nooks and crevices of  the bark of the tree it is not going to kill the   tree it is not harmful to the tree it just simply  kind of hangs on for dear life and then climb s up  

It does Bloom and it’s just a really kind of the  unique different aspect texture uh and height and   just all sorts of funest in with the garden so  got her in the ground biotone compost the whole  

Nine yards but yeah it’s been a great productive  day here at the chicken cpop Bren and I feel quite   accomplished and as always we hope you have found  this fun uh informative and inspirational y’all  

Have a great day thanks so much for growing with  Creek Side we’ll see you in the next video bye friends