Adding a Hydrangea Tree to My Rooftop Garden Which Hydrangeas Survived Winter in Pots

Hello, everyone. We are out on the garage deck today where I'm going to be adding another potted tree, and this is a type of tree I've wanted for a very long time. So I'm excited to add it to the garden. And that is a hydrangea tree. So I'm going to go over why I chose the variety that I did, because I have had many, many years of attempting to grow hydrangeas in my container garden here in Chicago. And some of them thrive and love to come back year after year. And some of them do not. I figure while I'm out here, I might also give you an update on some of the other different types of hydrangeas that I have out here that did survive winter. And I'm going to talk about a few that did not. But the hydrangea tree I've chosen for my garden is the little lime panicle hydrangea. I knew I was going to have to do a panicle hydrangea. Those are the most cold hardy. I'm zone 6A here in Chicago. And when you want to have something survive in a container over winter, you really want to try to go at least two zones lower. So zone 4. The little lime panicle hydrangea is hardy down to zone 3. It's zone 3 through 8. I think a lot of my other big leaf hydrangeas are maybe zone 5, which again, if I was growing them in the ground, perfect. Not so great for containers. But most of the panicles that I have are hardy down to zone 3. And I'd say 95% of the ones that I've grown have come back. So I have very high hopes for this hydrangea tree. This is the first tree hydrangea form I'm growing. Everything else so far has been a shrub. It can do part to full sun. It's probably going to get about part sun on the rooftop deck. And I have found that living in an urban area, gardening on rooftops where it can get very hot. Most of the hydrangeas do prefer a part sun environment compared to full sun. This tree is going to have light green colored blooms in the summer, and then they will fade to pink in the fall. So I'm really excited to see how that turns out. I also have some other panicle hydrangeas that will be white in the summer, but then also fade to a pink in the fall. So it's almost like having a garden transformation going from summer to fall. So now that I've talked about the tree, let me show you the container that I'm going to plant it in. This is the pot I'm going to plant the tree in, and I've chosen this for a few different reasons. One, I think the size will work for the whole lifetime of the tree. So this is from Crescent Garden. It is a self-watering container, and this is the 22 inch rim planter. Now that is 22 inches for the pot. The actual planting area is, I'd say, about 20 inches wide and maybe about 10 inches deep. Now, this is a black color pot, but it does stay pretty cool. We do get the direct sunlight again for about four to five hours on this area of the garden, but this pot always stays cool. But also it is double rimmed. So there's a wall here and there's a space where the water sits and then there's a wall inside. So the sun is never shining directly on the wall where the roots are. So I'm not concerned about the root ball burning. The double walls are also great for overwintering as well, because that gives some space between the freezing cold air and where the roots of the plant are. So I am hopeful that I can leave the hydrangea tree in this pot, roughly in this space overwinter. I'll probably wheel it back a few feet just so it's up against the wall there. But I'm hoping that this will survive in this pot overwinter and continue thriving for the entire lifetime of the tree. And like I said, this is on wheels. I like to put my heavy containers on wheels, so it's so much easier to move them around. And with that, I think it's planting time. So I'm going to plant the tree first. I definitely need to add some flowering annuals around it as well. And I will see how much I want to stuff this container. The first thing I'm going to do is add some slow release starter fertilizer. Again, not tied to any brand, but the one that I have on hand is the Coast of Maine Organic and Natural Starter Fertilizer. So I'm going to add that to the pot. So I'm just sprinkling that in and then mixing it around in the top couple inches of soil. So we're going to get the tree now into the pot and then I'll see how much space I have for other annuals and then we'll get everything watered and put into position. All right, let's see if that hole's deep enough. Perfect. Now for annuals around the hydrangea tree, I'm going to do the Super Beano Raspberry. I think I have six of these. So we'll see how much space those take up. But these are full to part sun and we'll get to about six to 12 inches tall. They're more of a mounting, slightly trailing habit. Here she is all potted up. I like the height that she's at right now. Obviously, planting her in the planter on wheels gives it more height than it had in its nursery pot. I think that works really well. Now, I like the amount of annuals I have in here. Could I physically cram more into the planter? Yes, but I think I'm going to choose to be responsible and just keep it to these six Super Beanas. The final step, then, is to fill up the reservoir here until that center blue circle pops up. That's how we know the reservoir is completely full. That middle blue circle is popped up, so we are good for now. And from my experience last year, I really only had to refill this like once every three weeks, even during the highest peak of summer. So this little limelight tree, I'm very excited for it. And again, I do think the variety I chose is perfect for my climate. I did want to one show you the other hydrangeas I have up here really quickly and also mention a hydrangea that was in this pot last year that did not survive winter. And that was the Fairy Trail Bride hydrangea. I don't remember the hardiness zone. I think it was maybe down to five. So I wasn't really expecting a lot. I was kind of like hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst. And it turned out to be the latter. However, I will say with our spring this year, it was so strange because things started to warm up and open and then it dropped down again into the 30s. So I think that did damage a lot of plants. So I don't know if it was the winter in general or that cold chalk during spring, but it did at least clear the way for a hydrangea tree that is much hardier. So now let me show you. I think I only have two other varieties up here. All of the hydrangeas that I have in this border. So right here, here, here, there's one more down there. Those are all also panicle hydrangeas. They are the Bobo hydrangeas, again, on the compact side as well. Those I planted last spring, maybe late spring, and they survived winter just fine. I didn't move the containers or anything. And then this is the other hydrangea variety that survived left outside on the deck in a container. This is tough stuff, top fun. It's a mountain hydrangea. This is hardy down to zone four compared to the panicles that I have that are hardy down to zone three. You can see there are some old wood stems that don't have buds on them. So I'm just going to prune these back. Did you have leaves opening on some of the old wood? And then I also have new wood stems popping up as well. So this is my one garden task for the day. But I hope that helped. If you are in a climate like mine trying to figure out what hydrangeas you might be able to add to your garden that aren't going to die at the end of the season, I will keep you updated on how this does. I think I see some flowers starting to form on the end, oh yes I do, on the end of some of the stems. So I cannot wait for that to be in full flower. I'm definitely going to show you that as well. But let me know if you have any questions and I will see you in the next video. Bye.