My first Hydrangea is now in the ground for more than 25 years. At this point, I keep it for sentimental reasons only. It's gotten so THICK with canes that if I wrap it in my usual cage, I have to get everything so tight in there that I think I may actually be suffocating the plant. I've not had good luck overwintering it in recent years. This past winter I didn't even bother with it. If I were you, I'd consider taking a cutting or digging out a portion of your sentimental one and essentially start over. It would indeed be the same plant, so you could keep your sentiment. But I can understand sentiment. I should get rid of my first Hydrangea, but I'm not. For a long time I would cut back the old canes completely to the ground in the Fall. I'd only leave canes that had shot up from low points on the canes or from the crown. They would have grown all summer and would end up giving me great flowering the next year. I'd have very long stemmed flowers, too, that I had cut. The big problem with this technique is that you end up with weaker stems than you would otherwise and next summer they'd be weighted down to the ground with their flowers. I've found that, for my zone, I can usually prune as hard as I want up until about Fourth of July, just to be easy to remember, and not hurt the flowering potential for next year. After that, the buds start setting for next year and you start running into that problem. (But then I've cut some "nikkos" back to the crown in the Fall and on some I'd get great flowering and on some I'd get none. Do I really understand this? NO.) So, here is another method for you to consider to keep it smaller, at least in height. Another thing I've experimented with is to prune all the wimpy growth completely out and just end up with a few stout canes over time. This was interesting, but you end up with an artifical looking Hydrangea and the few stout canes start looking rather strange. But with this technique, more or less, you could develop a plant that wasn't so crowded. I don't know though. I wish I could help you more. I'd like an answer to the question you have, too! Hay

Also Columbia, our rain gauge from two rains yesterday after 6:00 pm measured 5 1/2" before I emptied it. This morning after the night storms the gauge read 4". I know we will have to replant the cucumbers (had not come up yet), sure they are going to rot since the weather channels say we will get more inches before this system moves out. For now my flowers are rain beaten and shrubs all one sided. Got out this afternoon and helped my iris bed (shaking off the rain and dead ending the blooms. But several plants in the other beds just need SUN! Several country roads are closed, and still some inside the city. We did need the rain, just hate it when we get it all at one time. Love Mother Nature Just As I Do The "DIRT"!

Thanks Seil i hope my roses will be ok. its my first experience with roses. During the summer this area drains well with no problem (it gets dry during the heat wave in mid summer). its only floods for 1-2 weeks in the spring when the snow melt until the ground thaw and water disappear. I went to check my hydrangea (Annabelle, planted last year) and cut one of the branches and saw a green one at the bottom , i hope it will survive as well

When hydrangeas "go dormant", the leaves and blooms brown out and the stems harden and -sometimes- change color. But in tropical locations, they keep their foliage and produce new leaves while temporarily keeping the old leaves a tad longer. You can see this in mild winters sometimes; some of my oakleaf hydrangeas do that. I would not worry much at the plant's refusal to produce new foliage or branches. I have seen them produce leaves quickly and very slowly. It will do that when it wants to. All you can do is keep the soil evenly moist and properly fertilized. In Texas, many other shrubs go semi dormant during my hot summers. They (roses for example) stop blooming or produce small blooms or even produce blooms with a different color. Hydrangeas here do not show foliage changes in Summer but their root systems continue developing. So, just keep giving it TLC (tender loving care) until it decides to produce new growth. But your temps are way cooler than mine. Do not forget to fertilize more often when the shrub is potted. And amend the soil too so the soil does not become too alkaline.