They should - they are pretty resilient shrubs. But before cutting back to the ground, assess the damage first. It may not be necessary to be so drastic in your pruning. Remove all damaged stems first, then evaluate what else should go, considering the shaping of the end result.

They may just be bent and will recover. Does the plow driver have other options as to where the snow can go?

tj

I just had to bury my Nikko blue and probably hit it at least once with the big blower as I had to start wide to get enough of the driveway clear (we got thirty inches of snow in one storm, it was me or the shrubs, I chose me). They do tend to be rather flexible which is why it is where it is.

When the snow melts, you can feel free to clean up anything broken off and trim away any branches that are obviously broken but still slightly attached.

Leave the bent ones, they'll probably be just fine.

If the bush got unseated by the plow, just tamp it back down. The snow protected it very, very well, but it should be put back in the soil as rapidly as you can to protect the roots from freezing.

My bet? It'll be fine if you just check it didn't get unseated and clean it in spring after it greens up. Hydrangea are pretty sturdy.

Yes you would think with snow poles up they would not go any further but such was not the case

What, people respect markers? Please. :-) They closed off my driveway five (count 'em...five!) times during this latest storm.

Fortunately, I think it'll be just fine with some potential tamping back in. :-)

Unless we get more snow. I had heard that if I cut them down in the Spring I would not get any blooms this year. I just may move them in the fall of course to avoid this happening again if they survive.

gardengal so if I do cut them back in early spring how far should I cut them back and they will still grow back and bloom in the same season? and should or can I cut them each season in the fall ?

Thank everyone for helping me with this I was really sad this happend. In fact the person who told me it would not bloom this year if I cut it back in the Spring runs a garden and florist business.

Saturn

"In fact the person who told me it would not bloom this year if I cut it back in the Spring runs a garden and florist business."

It's because they're kind of correct. If you chop it back to the ground, blossoms are way, way less likely. Not entirely impossible, but far less likely.

So if the plant was heavily damaged and has to regrow from the base, it probably won't blossom well next year. It will devote its energy into regrowing greenery. But you might get lucky and still get some blooms.

If you cut it back too hard a bit later on, you're not going to get much in the way of blossoms. There's no hard and fast rule as to how hard you can cut when, because it's going to be very seasonally dependent. Before growth starts or as leaf buds form in early spring? You can always remove up to about a quarter (to a third, but that's pushing it in my experience with mine) at the cost of little to some minor blossom power.

Later on? That number goes way down...fast....as our winter-to-spring cycle goes around here in the Northeast. You know the cycle; 50 one day, 80 the next.

Cutting back too late in spring is also going to deprive you of most blossoms, if not all, as you'll take off the forming buds on the branch tips.

This is not a case of being wrong, but giving you the shortest blanket advice without being wordy. Since I'm regularly accused of being overly wordy (cough) around here, this is the kind of advice an overly-shorthanded person might give.

In this instance, the longer if-then-else clauses of the more wordy advice are actually more correct, but require that the person read through.

You want my advice? If you're dead-set on having it bloom, clean out the dead stuff in spring, shape as you absolutely have to, and wait until after it blossoms to do anything else. It's not the optimal time to reshape a hydrangea, but if you keep it watered and lightly fed, it'll adjust. Shape it better then.

Plan on moving it in late August as summer starts to fade to give it the maximum time to adjust to its new home, as you mentioned above. While we're not likely to get that kind of storm again for quite some time....well, they said that the last time, too. And here we are.

There were 3 people killed yesterday (the shooter killed his next door neighbors, then himself in his house) over snow and driveways in Pennsylvania. Crazy world out there.