Quick Fire Fab Hydrangea

If you live in colder parts of the country, most mophead hydrangeas won’t grow for you. Instead, choose the panicle hydrangea, which is incredibly cold-tolerant, and makes a great show with it’s big cones of white blooms. For a while most of the new varieties have been small, so we were delighted by the arrival of the Quick Fire Fab® Panicle Hydrangea. A taller bush, maturing between 6 and 8 feet tall, it would be a great specimen on a lawn, and is perfect when planted at the back of shrub beds. It can also be grown in a large tub or planter. With strong, upright stems, it holds the huge conical flowers firmly upright, without drooping or breaking. Each head is 6 inches long, fat and conical. Flowers are greenish when very young, rapidly turning white, and then, as summer proceeds, they begin at the bottom of each spike to turn pink, then red, until gradually the whole plant is covered in fabulous red flowers. Very easy to grow, and blooming even while young, this is also the earliest-blooming variety of al the panicle hydrangeas, so no waiting around for blooms – it’s a fabulous quick-fire start to the season with this great plant.

• Earliest blooming variety of all the panicle hydrangeas
• Abundant conical flower heads are white from late spring through summer
• At the first hint of fall the flowers turn pink, then red as the air cools
• A tough, reliable and easy plant for cold zones, and great in heat too
• Train as a bush or with a central stem, as you choose

Grow the Quick Fire Fab® Panicle Hydrangea in full sun, or in hot zones, with a little afternoon sun. The soil should be moist and well-drained, and this type of hydrangea tolerates drier soils than mopheads do, although it isn’t actually ‘drought tolerant’. Water new plants frequently, and established ones in summer, soaking slowly and deeply. Deer normally leave it alone, and it has no real pest or disease problems to worry about. Prune in spring, cutting back the stems from the previous year by one-third for an abundance of smaller flower heads, by half for slightly larger heads, and back to just 2 or 3 buds for the biggest heads, but in smaller numbers. Remove weak, twiggy growth at the same time, leaving a strong, open framework. If you want a single trunk, select a strong stem and stake it, removing lower stems over a season, and leave staked to protect from breakage.