Could be. If so, it should blooms "soon" assuming the invisible flower buds made it through the winter. Impossible to tell the variety without blooms although this would tell you its size at maturity. Some can get large and others are compact/dwarfs. It does not appear to be a problem at this point (it is obviously small). Can you ask the landscapers?

You could do either........but now is not the best time :-) If you were to cut it back now, you would remove any possibility of flowers this season and perhaps even next year. And it would simply grow back to the same size (or larger) very quickly. Unless a dwarf form, these are big shrubs!! Moving it is a possibility, but again the timing is wrong. Transplanting a large, established shrub just when it is expending a great deal of energy to push new growth is going to generate some serious transplant shock. That may not be insurmountable but it will certainly set the plant back. And watering this summer will be a major concern. Also, it is not recommended to prune or trim back the shrub before moving, as it needs all that foliage to regenerate the root system. This makes it far more difficult to move a large shrub during the growing season. If you can wait until fall when the shrub enters dormancy, you can trim it back proportionately (active growth has stopped; leaves falling naturally) and shrub roots in fall are already in a period of regular elongation, so far less chance of transplant shock and much better chance of reestablishment through the rest of the fall and into winter.

She was just going to "clean up " the yard. Realtor had this weird theory that plants should not touch the client as they walk around the yard. CRAZY. She hired a colorblind gardener and he weeded out all my lirope and wandering jew. He took out 6 greek pattern plants, velvet leafed hummingbird plant, all sorts of stuff. I mean he raped my yard. I was away for the weekend of the open house and she had the house sold by the time I got home. I wanted to kill her but I also wanted to kiss her. The plant was about 6 ' tall and it was in its beginnings of fall colors. It was beautiful.

The main and original function of the taproot is to give initial stability to the brand new plant when grown from seed and that is why the tap root grows deep down into the ground. The taproot then develops small fibrous roots from which it absorbs water and nutrients from the soil until the plant grows old enough. When it grows old enough, many secondary, tiny and fibrous roots start growing from the sides and from the crown of the oakleaf hydrangea. The hydrangea will then absorb water and nutrients from these new guys. At this point, the need/usefulness for the taproot is over and the latest secondary and fibrous roots absorb water and nutrients from the soil. If you then cut a "no longer useful" taproot, nothing bad happens. The hydrangea will continue to grow as usual. Interestingly, when beginners do bonsai, the taproot of a plant is cut so that a tall plant can be fitted in the small bonsai container. Also, "real" trees usually do not have a carrot-type taproot though, but they develop lateral roots that, in turn, develop vertical roots.