Temps are predicted to drop significantly into the teens over the next 3 to 5 days and snow for tomorrow night and Saturday. Only an inch though. Not enough to cover and do much good. But then next week sometime it's supposed to go back up into the 40s again! What a crazy winter! Snow fall amounts are less than half what it was last year at this time and days above freezing are more than twice as many. I watered my roses today! We haven't had any significant precipitation in several weeks and it has been very sunny the last few days so I thought maybe they'd like a drink. I also think they'll fare better in the cold snap if they're well hydrated. I had to lug gallon jugs of water out, ugh! If this weather does keep on like this I'm going to ask his nibbs to hook the hose back up!

This year, I tried something different around the porch and really like it. I put a large pot (20" square) on each side of the porch and put a star jasmine in the center and some white petunias on the edges. Three or four petunias for each pot should be plenty, since they spread quickly. They were so beautiful in the evening and had a wonderful fragrance. I'm zone 4, so they're annuals here too, but Lowe's had star jasmine for $5 a piece, so for $15 I had two beautifully planted pots. The white petunias attract hummingbird moths, which are fun to watch in the evening and the fragrance was so relaxing. Something like that might be nice for your bench :) (I know there's more fragrance in humid areas, but we have very dry and hot summers in eastern Washington and it still was a great combination.)

Hello, midwaycat. In your location, you probably can use just about any of the macrophyllas (aka, mophead or lacecap with white, blue, purple or pink blooms), arborescens (mophead or lacecap blooms too), quercifolia (aka, oakleaf; has panicle shaped white blooms too... usually) and paniculata varieties (white or green panicle shaped blooms). To obtain best results meaning reliable bloomage, consider use of arborescens and paniculata shrubs as these produce flower buds in Spring and are normally not impacted by winter weather issues. Also, in my opinion, their leaves handle “too much sunlight” issues better than macrophyllas so they have less wilting or drooping. Examples of arborescens hydrangeas are Annabelle (white blooms but sometimes suffers from flopping due to the weight of wet blooms), Incrediball (white larger blooms; less bloom flopping after 3+ years), Invencibelle Spirit (pink blooms; two versions: I or II), Bella Anna (pink blooms; have not seen it for some reason lately at my local nurseries though); White Dome (a lacecap version of Annabelle). The species versions of H. arborescens is also sold out there; has white blooms in lacecap form but White Dome's blooms look better to me. Because arborescens cannot be seen with bloomage some times of the year (nurseries cut them for unknown reasons ???), and since wrong plant labels are a problem that happens, it may be useful to see these arborescens plants in bloom before buying so you can match the bloom against the bloom in the plant label. Thus, if the plant has lacecap-type blooms and the plant label says Annabelle, woops, beware. You can use any of the macrophyllas or oakleaf varieties too but they can be affected by winter weather because their invisible flower buds develop in the July-August time frame and open in Spring. They have bigger leaves too so they can be a pain with leaf wilting/drooping in the hottest part of the year and especially in their first summer(s). If winter gets way too cold for the plant hardiness or if the temperatures fluctuate enough to make the plants break dormancy, that can kill the invisible flower buds. Just recently, these last two winters, I have had issues with both of those 2 types. Last winter, I had some –not all- macs and oakleafs not bloom. Two years ago, I had almost zero bloomage from all those (but the arborescens and paniculatas came thru with no problems). White macs that only bloom once in Spring but which impressed me with their reliable bloomage are Mme. Emile Moulliere and Sister Theresa (or Sister Therese). Those two macrophyllas (mopheads) are non-rebloomers, produce invisible flower buds in July-August and tend to flower when similar ones do not. Macrophyllas that advertise reblooming will have blooms as usual in Spring and then again in the July-ish time frame and perhaps still again in mild winters. These can be good for you because you do not loose bloomage for the whole year when there is a bad winter. You may loose the Spring bloomage for example but there should be another set of blooms later on. The Endless Summer Series, the Together & Ever Series, the Let’s Dance Series and so forth include examples of these mopheads and lacecaps that re-bloom. Most of them are great as they include colored blooms: white blooms or either blue-ish/purple-ish blooms in acidic soil or pink-ish in alkaline soil. But for really reliable bloomage, you may have to winter protect them even if they are hardy. Winter issues are not usually a problem for me so. I do not winter protect. But I pay the price (no or limited bloomage) on 'bad' winters. The oakleaf hydrangeas have oak shaped leaves, are hardy to zone 5 and have plain gorgeous Fall Leaf colors! I have a compact Pee Wee that does not disappoint and it develops reddish leaves in November. There are other compact ones and even much larger ones (10’) so check the plant labels to see if the size will be good in your planned location(s). Little Honey has yellowish leaves and is compact. Other compact ones are Sikes Dwarf, Vaughn’s Lillie, Ruby Slippers, Munchkin, and some of the Gatsby Series. Oakleafs are more drought resistant than the other hydrangeas but, they catch root rot if allowed to sit in water for long periods of time. Paniculatas are extremely hardy to Zone 3, have smaller leaves and develop invisible flower buds in Spring-early Summer. They include many interesting new compact versions whose name has the word “little” in the name: Little QF or Little Quickfire (very early blooming for a paniculata), Little Lamb, Silver Dollar, Sweet Summer, Little Lime (a compact version of Limelight with green blooms that stay green longer with the less sun that they get), Strawberry Sundae (a compact version of Strawberry Vanilla), Wedding Gown, etc. Fall is a good time to plant but during the Fall Season, many nurseries usually have zero or low inventories. If you find any now, the good news might be that the plant has spent the growing season developing a large root system so you get a larger plant than if you had bought it in the Spring or early Summer. Do prune any roots circling in the pots. Size is usually not much an issue as most times, they tend to grow a lot quickly. But I have had some that hardly grow on year 1 and leave growth for years 2 or 3. Go figure. As long as their soil acidity, sunlight exposure and soil moisture requirements are met, you should be fine. Too much sun can make the leaves turn all yellow including the leaf veins. But I suspect your area does not have summers with a strong summer sun like I do. Do not let them have wet-dry-wet-dry soil conditions but evenly moist soil with lots of mulch. Use 3-4” of mulch up to the drip line to protect the roots from the cold temps and lengthen the soil moisture; fertilize in Spring with ½ to 1 cup of organic mulch, composted manure or cottonseed meal; use liquid seaweed, liquid fish or coffee grounds thru the rest of the growing season (but stop fertilzing by thend of June so they will go dormant at the appropriate time); and again, maintain the soil evenly moist as best as you can. Stop watering when the soil freezes but, while dormant during mild dry winter months, you can water during dry months once every week or once every 2 weeks. If your soil is alkaline, plant nurseries will offer for sale amendments that can be used to acidify the soil. I amend in Spring and sometimes again by late summer or early Fall. In alkaline soils, the leaves can turn light green or even yellow-ish colors while the leaf veins remain dark green giving the leaf a skeletal look. Be aware that hydrangea blooms start life with a certain color and, as time passes, the blooms mature and change color until, at the end, the blooms are brown. You can keep these brown blooms for winter interest or deadhead them. Consider too that if you go shopping now, whatever hydrangea bloomage you see now in the local nurseries may not be (color wise) what you will see in Spring. Originally white blooms may now be green-ish or pink-ish. Due to the reduced supply of plants now, consider buying the in Spring instead. But also consider that it may be cheaper to buy now (one of my local nurseries have azaleas and hydrangeas on sale 30% off). Oh, decisions, decisions, right? A book like Hydrangeas by Glyn Church contains good info if you want to learn about these shrubs. For online reading, I recommend going to this website: http://hydrangeashydrangeas.com/ I hope that helps. By the way, if you post pictures of the planting location(s) and its dimensions, I am sure a lot of folks will chime in with specific suggestions. Luis

Interesting what you said about the oakleafs, Mary. My oakleafs dd not bloom two winters ago either. And one oakleaf did not bloom last winter but the others did. Since the stems leafed out normally both times, I assume the flower buds got killed somehow; watering issue or a weather problem that made the plant break dormancy just as a cold snap arrived (that would kill the flower buds if not winter protected). I am hoping for better results this year too and will check the soil moisture more during this winter in order to figure this out and rule all possible issues. Oakleafs are hardy to Z5 but the production of flower buds in July-August can be a problem in winters like the last two. However, oakleafs are not alone. My mopheads were a complete disaster area two winters ago (ie, no blooms), well, except for one. Last winter was an improvement but I still had about half of them not blooming. Same thing as the oakleafs... the stems leafed out ok but got no blooms. No wonder I sometimes stop and look and wonder when I see remontant ones. Ha! Good luck to the two of us this winter. Paniculatas would most likely get around this problem since they bloom on new wood but they do not have mophead's colored blooms and they bloom very late (early June here but in July-August in Michigan). My Little Lime and Little Quickfire have done well. I am going to take my sister's young kids to see a movie for free but the price is they have to help with the winter protection. Hee hee hee. We will see how and if that works. ;o)