Have I killed my potted Hydrangea?

Hello everyone,

What do you think - has my once lovely Hydrangea gone to heaven?!

So I made an error by buying a cheap plastic container with no drainage holes. I am new to gardening so didnt know then how important drainage holes were. For a good 2 weeks it seemed to thrive. Lush looking and blooming. Then some of the flowers started to get brown edges so I turned to google and found out about the possibility of root rot from poor drainage.

So I took the plant out of the pot and rested it on a bin liner whilst my husband drilled some drainage holes in the bottom. The roots looked very white but the soil was extremely wet through. By the time I came to do this, the the flowers were starting to wilt too (as well as some petals turning brown on the edges).

I put some grit in the bottom of the pot and used a potting mix that would give it nutrients for 4 months and help with healthy roots.

That was yesterday...today the plant is wilting even more.

I know it needs lots of water, but I was so worried I had over watered it with the lack of drainage for 2 weeks, I dont know if I am now under watering in my bid to prevent root rot. I wonder if I am killing it with the lack of water.

If the roots were white, does this mean root rot didnt start?

I dont know what I am doing tbh!

Anyone got any words of wisdom to help me??

Many thanks!

 

I thought mine had died last year - no water from me but loads from up above and then a dry spell! There was no sign of life at all and I put the pot to one side and ignored it. This year -reincarnation, I hope yours does the same but my only advice is don't try to do too much, nature is very clever. Good luck.

 

Give it a chance
I am trying to establish a time line in your query and it only seems to be a 2-3 week one (?)

White roots do not necessarily mean root rot

While a hydrangea does require a fair bit of watering (hydra = water) they are fairly resilient plants/shrubs. The wilt may simply be due to fluctuations in its care.
Doesn't matter what you did to it yesterday; the wilt will be symptomatic of what it has experienced for the past few weeks

Now: a few basics we need to know to give you the very best of advice:-

• where are you located?
• where do you have your plant sited? (East/West/South/North facing? = Full sun? Total shade? Mix of the two?)
• what size pot is it in?
• do you have a picture you can upload?
• which type of compost are you using?

 

Hi,

Thanks for trying to help. I'm in Lancashire. It has been in sun all morning until about 2pm then shade for the rest of the day in my north west facing garden.

The compost is gro sure containers and baskets mix.

The pot size it (approx) 12" height and about 12" diameter.

I bought the plant already nicely established and planted it about 2 weeks ago.

I really wish i could send a picture! I don't have anyway to upload phone pics to my laptop to save and upload to this forum.

I hope this helps paint a clearer picture :-)

 

Ok, being in full sun for part of the day and shade for the reminder should not be a problem for most hydrangeas

The "wilt" may be due simply to a change of scenery/conditions. Be patient with it and see how it g(r)oes. I would definitely not write it off: yet!

The danger of Google is: if you have an ache in your arm ... you google ... and you have cancer! (When, in actual fact, you have muscle strain! )

Keep it well watered, but free draining. Give it another couple/three weeks and I think you will see a vast improvement. But, in the meantime: look at the bottom of the plant pot. Do you see white roots crawling out of the bottom? ( If yes: Re-pot to a larger sized pot)

I think it will be fine and the wilt/browning is just a temporary issue

 

Thank you so much for your words of encouragement.

Haha yes Google is both a blessing and curse.

I'll keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best!

 

I had the same thing happen when 2 gift hydrangeas came in pots without drainage holes and my dad had left them floating in a plastic crate of rainwater to top it off! They were very poorly and most leaves went brown and I had to pull them off. Was left with 2 stalky messes but noticed new growth coming from the inner base so crossed my fingers! They are now back to their original height of about 40cm and doing very well, has taken a couple of months though. Good luck!

 

This is music to my ears! I'm much more hopeful now. Thanks for sharing!

 

Let it dry RIGHT out first.

That's a big pot. If it was in a much smaller pot when you bought it? then a 12" pot which is waterlogged will be a huge amount of excess water (relative to the size of plant - if the plant was already used to being in a 12" pot then "relatively speaking" the excess water would be less - the plant would be more able to drink it).

So ... before the plant can get back to normal it has to deal with the water. IF the rootball is well established (which would mean that you bought the plant in that 12" pot) you could take it out of the pot and stand it on newspaper which will "wick" the water away from the rootball.

If you potted it on into the 12" pot then all the new compost will fall away from the rootball when you tip the plant out - I think that might still be worth doing though, so you can stand it on newspaper to dry it out. Keep the compost to repot it again later, but pot it into a smaller "good fit" pot for the size of its rootball, temporarily - i.e. try to get the size of the pot / compost / rootball "rightsize" for the plant whilst it recovers, that will minimise the amount of wet compost, and thus the amount the plant has to "drink" before the compost is back to normal moisture levels.

Put the plant in full shade until it has recovered, and don't feed it (high concentration of salts at its roots may stress it further). When a plant is overwatered it shuts down - to protect itself. This makes it wilt (because it is not drinking any water, so in effect it doesn't have enough water in the leaves - much the same as if it was too dry which would also make the plant shut down, to preserve water, and would wilt). So ... the plant is assuming there has been a flood, and that the flood will go away soon, and then it would get back to normal and start drinking again. Trouble is, in a pot, that natural draining doesn't happen as well as when a flood occurs out in the open.

If the plant stays in the sun it will have to cope with the heat of that, in its wilted state, as well.

Having said all that, Hydrangeas are tough, so I would expect it to survive and recover. The flowers will suffer this year though I'm afraid, and it may drop some/all of its leaves.

Once you see fresh new shoots growing then you can move it back to its sunny position, and pot it back into the larger pot.

 

Fantastic advice - thank you. I did wonder this morning if I should indeed be drying out the plant to reverse the effects.

It's raining like mad here now which is the last thing I need! Tomorrow is another day...