Below you will see my beautiful blooming Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Mariesii Variegata’!  Beautiful blooms this year anyway.  For the last few years it was merely an interesting shrub with lovely variegated foliage.  Now don’t get me wrong – there is nothing wrong with lovely variegated foliage.  But one does not simply plant a Hydrangea macrophylla ‘Mariesii Variegata’ for lovely foliage.  One wants blooms and preferably lots of them! 

         Well, let this be a lesson for you on the proper timing for pruning.  Many things can benefit from pruning in the dormant season but that doesn’t mean everything needs to be pruned at that time.  I live with a pruner, an industrious pruner, in fact I would go so far as to say a pruner of Olympian status.  She believes there is no plant problem that a good pruning won’t solve.  In the case of the before mentioned hydrangea, however, timing was way off.  In addition to pruning out frost-damaged portions of the plant, my happy pruner was cutting out the dormant buds for the upcoming blooms. 

         This type of hydrangea blooms on ‘old wood,’ in other words stems from the previous year’s growth.  If that is all pruned out you are left with lovely variegated foliage but no blooms. This past year I was able to distract attention from the hydrangea with some unruly roses and now – blooms!  If pruning is needed to maintain shape or size, the proper time is right after the bloom so that the plant can continue to grow through the summer and early fall producing flower buds for the next spring.