I have some yellowing this year, too. I blame it on the rain.

Hello, Lyban. A few yellow ones due to heat stress is normal in the summer for paniculatas so feel free to return back to the yard for some iced tea or some wine. I did notice a much smaller hydrangea with greenish blooms that is close to the rightmost chair in Picture 1. Make sure it is a "compact" one or it will get too wide for the spot. What are the other plants in Pic 1?

Thank you all for your reassurance.

luis, that’ll s a little lime and I am hoping that spot will be good for it. I just planted that new one two weeks ago.

Lovely garden! And as Luis said, I wouldn’t worry at this time of year especially in zone 4. I am starting to see a few of the red maples just starting to get color, so we are well through summer. I woke to 45 F this morning, and the plants are reacting to decreasing daylight and cooler temperatures after an unusually hot summer.

Lyban, unless you want the hydrangeas overlapping the patio by at least a couple of feet or you are planning to turn them into tree form, I would move the panicled hydrangeas that are on the right side of the first photo farther out from the patio. Just widen the outer edge of the bed in a long gentle sweep of a curve, or if you want a straight edge, widen the entire bed. IME in New England which is similar to Montreal, they love our cool growing conditions and will reach towards the upper edge of their size range, for Little Lime around 5’. I don’t know what the one in the bottom right corner is, but you may want to consider moving it also.

As an example, my Pinky Winky, which I have seen listed as 6’ tall and wide is in my garden 8’ tall and over 10’ wide. Panicled hydrangeas are difficult to control for size with pruning because they regrow to almost the same size within the growing season but tend to have larger, fewer blooms and more flexible stems on new wood, so the form may not be as nice. So my experience is to plant assuming that it will grow to the largest estimated size or even perhaps a bit larger so that you don’t have to prune or move an overly large plant.

Nhbabs....thank you for liking my little garden. We put that patio in to replace a rotting wood one two years ago. I planted 4 standard hydrangeas, the two VS in the back and the two pinky winkys flanking the steps.

each year I am learning my mistakes. I just planted the little lime 2 weeks ago hoping it will no go past three feet but it probably will so I will take your advice and enlarge that circle.

the VS are in full sun and the PW in more shade. I do not like my white phlox in that location because it is too tall and I feel it is taking away from the beauty of the VS .

I would like to plant in a couple of weeks three hydrangeas around the shed in back. I was thinking of bobo or little lime or .??? It gets full sun early and then dappled sun later on. What do you think?

Oh, my! I would seriously consider moving those Pinky Winky further out. Mine at 9 years is something approaching 12’ wide and I imagine yours will look squished against the steps given a few years. I will see if I have a photo for you of mine, but others have posted some of the larger panicled hydrangeas looking quite squished.

With that level of shade, have you considered one of the smooth hydrangeas/ H. arborescens for around the shed? I have Annabelle where it gets sun until about 2 and it does well. There are also some pink ones.

From the photo I like how the white phlox adds to the frothy impression, but it may be different in person.

Edited to add that the photo Hyed posted half way down the linked thread shows what I think your Pinky Winkys may look like in a few years since they like Hyed’s Limelights and Quickfire are of a similar large size.

https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/5724796/your-thoughts-on-limelight-hydrangea-placement#n=20

and edited to add a photo of my Pinky Winky. In this photo the plant was in its 4th growing season, and to give an idea of scale, the spiral trellis visible when the photo is enlarged is 5’ tall. I had to move the trellis a couple of years later because the shrub had completely covered it.

Nhbabs,

moving my pinky winkys out would be next to impossible considering the space there but I will think about that.

It was a landscaping and garden center that suggested those placements when doing my patio that is why it angers me that they should have known better, oh well that is life.

i have annabelles in the front of my house. For years I loved them but now I get so frustrated with their drooping after rain and always looking messy so I hesitate to plant more around shed. You mentioned pink annabelles , that I have never seen. I will look into it.

Nhbabs,

me again. I just returned from the garden nursery and found the arborescens incrediball blush. I decided that I would give them a try for around shed. The info on web makes them sound lovely even though right now they are not very pretty.

Looks like those Incrediballs were made to bloom early and the blooms are now spent. But that is ok. Give them a try. From posts in here, Incrediballs appear to have stronger stems but that does not mean they will never flop. Given a strong enough storm, they still might.

There is one branch already flopping in the picture. Was it like that when you bought it?

Yes, I think it might have been broken. I will go out when the rain stops and clip that one off. A lot of the stems have been cut off but they told me next year I will get multiple stems.

they were in a crowded area of clearance items so not necessarily looking very good.

That's typical of how Incrediball Blush flowers will age and timing. It's the end of August after all.

Do you have any pennlake? I would love to see a photo of them in full bloom from a private garden and nor the web.

I'm not a picture taker, but the color is nice and I think the photos online are accurate. Here it is now, you can see the color has faded. Peak color around here outside of Minneapolis is late June through July. One complaint I have on these pink flowered H. arborescens is the flowers don't seem to antique a nicely as the white flowered selections. More brown tones.

That is beautiful with the green mixed in with the pink. I hope mine look as nice next year. Thanks for the photo.

VS prune to tree form as of today