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did I possibly add too much aluminum sulfate?

15 years ago

Hi all. I added some aluminum sulfate I think it's called...to my Nikko Blue hydrangea, to ensure the color would come out blue. Some of the mopheads are almost in full bloom, and thus far while I can see tinges of light blue, the bulk of the mopheads appears to be very ligth green. Might the blue color eventually deepen, or is it possible I added too much aluminum, and if so, will that remove color altogether resulting in that light green shade? Is there anything I can do to swing the color back the other way, to more of a blueish purple?

Thank you!!!

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Comments (3)

luis_pr
15 years ago
Immature blooms are very common on some hydrangeas and they look green at first & then change to their "appropriate" color shortly thereafter (it may take 4-7 days). Depending on the hydrangea variety, this color can be a shade of pink, or a shade of blue (or purple) or it can be white. As a result, take no further actions; you need to wait until the bloom color matures so you will get an idea of how your previous application of a/s affected the eventual bloom color.
moonshadow
15 years ago
My Nikko blooms typically open a light green and then shortly change to deeper bluish hue. Sometimes the tinges of green will stay all season along with the blue, but I personally like that look, it's interesting!

Be careful with alum sulfate! I learned a hard lesson this year. I have always used it for my established, mature plants in the ground. No adverse effects. However this year I finally was able to replace several rare or harder to find varieties in my area and put alum sulfate around them per package instructions. I have lost one altogether. Loaded with blooms, it's now fried crispy brown, top to bottom. By all appearances it looked sun scorched and parched. But I knew lack of water was not the case, we've had excessive rains. And not excessive sun as I planted it in nearly all day dappled shade. Then one of the blooms had some petals show color that was the funkiest shade of aqua I've ever seen. That's when I knew the alum sulfate was the culprit (and it only took a little over a week to produce that funky color and burn, when usually it takes several months for soil to be fully amended). The others I flushed well with water, dug up and repotted/replanted with all new fresh soil and flushed again. Looks like they'll be OK, thank goodness! So I learned (and since have read) that young plant roots do have the potential to succumb to burn.
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Lynn Nevins
Original Author
15 years ago
Thanks for replies. You're exactly right! The light green parts have begun to turn...to beautiful shades of blue and purple! I'm so smitten, especially since (for whatever reason) this particular plant produced no mopheads at all for the past two years.

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