This will be on Dr Phil Monday if anyone is interested Here is a link that might be useful: Dr Phil - bring back my child

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

Layering will not work if the soil surounding the wound is not kept constantly moist. If the soil dries out it has a tendency to die or more likely form a callous and heal. The moisture is the primary trigger for the plant cells to create roots. Layering in a top layer of loose mulch with out irrgation is prone to failure. Also the wound should be no more then a scratch, if not at all, as mentioned above. I layered about 25 plants the summer. Layering creates the best quality plants. This plant was created through layering last August 2004 and the photo taken in November of 2004 sometime. The root system seems to go crazy in the fall. dave

I can't imagine what you're problem might be, Bob! I put in a Reliance about four years ago, not really expecting to ever get any fruit since it doesn't get "enough" sun, in my opinion, but last year I actually got a few very small bunches! This year there are lots of little bunches! I'm surprised, and delighted! And mine is planted in some pretty bad clay! One thing that pretty much freaks me out every year is that as near as I can tell the plant has died over winter! This year I started to get a little bit used to it, but it starts growing very late, and until I can see new growth it absolutely looks dead--the vines "snap" off as if they were dead and I can find absolutely no visible signs of life. So, you haven't been digging yours up and throwing them away "too early," have you? I can't imagine that if you have several of them, but just thought I'd mention it since I was about to do that with mine the very first year! I DID plant mine from a 2-gallon potted plant, so I think doing that would definitely give you an edge over bare root. And since you've been having such a (strange!) problem with them, I recommend trying just one or two at a time until you figure out what's going wrong. At least that way it won't be "quite so disappointing" as having a whole bunch of them dying. I can't imagine this is the problem either, but, just trying to think of anything that could help, I can't use vermiculite in any soil I use or I invariably wind up keeping stuff too wet and rotting them off! Doesn't seem to me that would be a real problem in the ground, but is there any chance they were staying too wet? On the other extreme, if you have "pure" sand just a couple feet down, is there any chance that "all" the water is running straight thru your planting layer, and that they're staying too dry? Like I said, just whatever possibilities I can think of! If you have two feet of "soil" on top of the sand, it's hard for me to imagine that's a real problem either! Maybe you just need to drive up here and take a load of my Colorado Clay home with you to plant them in! I think wind/desiccation could be a very real problem, but I don't have any recommendations to help with that! And I also find it hard to believe that ALL of them would die, every time, from just that. I do tend to "hose mine down" (the vines) anytime I'm out hand watering over winter. But I always kind of assumed that made ME feel better than the plants! Not sure about that! Well, you asked for Thoughts! There's a bunch of them! Not sure any of them will help tho! I very definitely agree with PopMama! Your tenacity is amazing! And since it's something you really want, I say keep trying! Sooner or later something has to work! Good luck! Let us know (next spring!) when you get one/some that make it! Skybird