“Good things come to those who wait”.
Really? Does that apply with plants also? Cause I ain’t feeling that dawg. I’ve waited and waited and for me at least, the good never comes. In fact, it usually gets worse.
That is, until my Hydrangea ‘Lady in Red’ took off this spring, and I never saw it coming:
I planted this lacecap hydrangea back in 2006 as I was seduced by the promise of stunning fall color. She was given a prominent location along the path to my front door and I was pumped.
Well, for three years, I waited for something – reddish/purple fall color, blooms, the deep red veining – and I got a big bag of nothing. It looked like one of my ‘Endless Summer’ hydrangeas. Nothing terrible, just “OK”.
In 2009, I relocated LIR to a minor league location to let it fade into the sunset. If the deer found it, so be it. Over the next two years I forgot about it and moved on.
Fast forward to 2011. LIR decides to put in an effort and damn if she didn’t look good y’all. The foliage was clean as can be with a nice reddish hue and with red veining on the leaves/stems as originally promised:
She also bloomed her butt off:
So I should leave it be and let her enjoy the new location, right? Wrong. I moved her immediately back to my front bed, where I’m sure she will disappoint again. I just can’t help myself. We’ll see … I’m hoping this will work out, even if she struggles a bit at first in her new home.
It’s been about two months now since the big move and the foliage still looks great. Here she is in late August:
And this week as the cold weather approaches:
At this point, LIR is about 4 x 4 and is located in a spot that gets afternoon shade – hopefully the perfect location. This time I’ll be more patient (you believe that?) and hopefully we will continue down the same positive path.
Have a great weekend.
John
I have two Ladies and adore them. The heat faded them way too soon this year, but we will see as it is now cooling a bit. As I preach….patience, patience, patience.
I’m sold.
I haven’t heard of this one, wonder if it is hardy in sone 5.
Eileen
Hydrangeas are wonderful plants. It will do fine there.love the colour.
LOL. She surprised you and the landscape alright. Showed off her beauty–flowers and foliage all 🙂 Your pics of her are lovely.
I’m a very impatient gardener. That’s why I rarely plant things that take awile to establish/bloom. I want immediate gratification.
But I have a few things that took longer than I expected to be awesome, most noteably my camellia. It took three years for it to have more than three blooms on it, and then POW. Tons of them.
Besides my various fruit trees I think I miss the hydrangea flowers and the wisteria the most. My husband hardly did anything to them (he has a green thumb though) and they were huge, colorful and spectacular near my shady front door. Our desert life of course has none of that….