Here’s How You Can Change The Color Of Your Hydrangeas
Hydrangeas are unique flowers due to their big, bushy blooms. As you probably already know, they typically come in either blue or pink.
No other flower resembles fluffy cotton candy as closely as the colorful hydrangeas do.
But there’s something else that makes the hydrangea a stand-out plant. It is the only flower that can change color.
Depending on the acidity of your soil, you can transform your hydrangeas from blue to pink or pink to blue.
Who knew you could alter nature in this way? It might seem like magic, but it’s really just a little science!
In soil with a pH below six, which is considered strongly acidic, the flowers will turn blue. This means your hydrangeas are not absorbing aluminum from the soil.
If your soil’s pH level is above seven, the flowers will be pink, so you know the plant is getting aluminum.
Oh, and get this. In neutral or slightly acidic soil with a pH of six to seven, the blooms can be purple or a mixture of blues and pinks on the same shrub.
Here’s how you can change your soil conditions and manipulate hydrangeas to your desired color. And no, you don’t have to be a botanist to do it!
Marina Andrejchenko – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only
To make the soil more acidic and your hydrangeas blue, add a half cup of garden sulfur around the dirt beneath the hydrangeas.
To make it more alkaline, therefore raising the pH, use ground lime in the soil for pink blooms. You may need to reapply the garden sulfur or lime over the course of several months to see results.
It’s definitely a waiting game. You may not even notice a change until the flowers emerge again next blooming season.
It’s also worth mentioning that not all types of hydrangeas are able to change color. Plants with white flowers do not respond to adjustments in soil chemistry. White blooms will stay white.
And as a final note, avoid messing with the soil pH if you have just planted your hydrangeas into the ground. Wait for them to settle into their environment for a season before trying to change the flower color.
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