How to Prepare Limelight Hydrangea Tree for Winter

Limelight hydrangea trees are popular as four season trees but they are also known as deciduous trees. For those who are not familiar with the term deciduous, it means they are dormant during the whole winter.

During and before the winter months, Limelight hydrangea trees need some extra care. Then, what should you do to prepare a Limelight hydrangea tree for winter? Find out the answer to the question by reading these followings.

Preparing Limelight hydrangea tree for winter

In order to prepare Limelight hydrangea trees for winter, you can add the dead blooms off. It should be done to prevent the snow from weighting the branches down and breaking them off. Aside from that, it is also better for you to add a few inches of mulch around the base to help hold moisture in and to insulate the roots. In addition, another thing that you can do is to wrap the trunk with anything like felt, newspaper, burlap, or a tree guard loosely to protect it from the wind. It is also effective to protect the tree from the deer during the winter, the time when they are starving. Actually, it is not that important if you do not live in a place that does not have very harsh winters or the first you are not in the first year or two after planting.

Ways to take care of Limelight hydrangea tree

Taking care of Limelight hydrangea tree is particularly easy if you know how to do so. In general, the methods to take care of them are divided into four. Here is the explanation of each of them:

Watering and fertilizing:

1. To keep the soil moist during the first year after planting, you will need to water Limelight hydrangea trees as often as needed.
2. When watering the plant, please keep the kind of soil in mind. When you plant it in the soil that drains slowly, then you might have to water it twice a week.
3. You can check the soil by using your finger before watering. If you think it is moist, then you can wait for another day or two to water.
4. As the Limelight hydrangea tree keeps growing, it is needed for you to reduce the amount of watering.
5. Feel free to use a soaker hose to water the shrub or you can use your hand in order to avoid getting the leaves wet. Keeping away the leaves from the water is good to prevent the disease related to fungi.
6. Next to the plant, you can put a 1-inch deep dish or can to measure how much water is delivered in inches when a soaker hose is used. Please check the can regularly.
7. Do not forget to spread a 2 to 3 inch depth of mulch over the soil around the shrub so you can reduce the moisture loss via evaporation.
8. As soon as planting the new leaves started in the spring, please fertilize the Limelight hydrangea tree. The fertilizer should be spread over the soil around the plant.
9. In case the plant is not blooming, you are recommended to alter the fertilizer with a 10-30-10 ratio the following spring.

Pruning:

1. When the spring arrives or when you are in the late winter, you are suggested to prune your plant to reduce the size, to improve the appearance and to encourage the plant in producing the larger flowers.
2. Please cut the stems back by less than 10% to 20% in the first winter or the early spring of the shrub.
3. As the plant ages, it is needed to prune it more often.
4. Do not forget to always use the sharpened hand pruners when pruning one branch at the same time.

Getting rid of pests:

1. For every gardener, you are encouraged to check your plant for pest activity since there is a high chance of them to be attacked by snails, slugs, spider mites, aphids, thrips, and spittle bugs.
2. If all the things mentioned above bother your plant, you can either pick them off the shrub and drop them anywhere you want.
3. It is important for you to know the appearance and the difference of aphids, spider mites, spittlebugs, and thrips.
4. Once you have found them and gathered all of them, it is time for you to get rid of them, which can be done by using water. You can spray the plant in the morning for more than once each week. Please do it on every part and do not leave anything.
5. If the pests are still there and causing serious issues even after spraying with water, then you can try to spray the shrub with insecticidal soap.

Combating diseases:

1. There are several diseases that lurk the Limelight hydrangea trees. Some of them include leaf spots, bud blight, rust and mildew.
2. If you want to solve the issue, you can monitor your watering habits. Since all of them are caused by fungi, please prevent the leaves from getting wet when you are watering. It is also effective to water in the morning so that the leaves can dry before evening if they do get wet.
3. Cutting away the parts of the plant with diseases is also recommended. After that, you can spray the disinfectant.
4. Another common issue that usually occurs is bacteria wilt. The shrub of the plant will be infected at the base and then the bacteria will bother the flow of moisture and nutrients until to the rest of the shrub. The sad news is that you cannot help but witnessing a shrub is infected by the bacteria wilt. In the end, the leaves and the stems will wilt and it is possible for the entire shrub to die within weeks. The only thing that you can do is to do appropriate watering. Please let the soil dry when it is wet before watering again and if it is dry, please water the shrub more regularly.