This is just as much a post about lawn edging as it is the plant itself. I'll explain.

I planted the H. paniculata last year, second week of June. Things went pretty normal but this spring, I was a little disappointed at how spindly the plant grew this summer.

My first reaction with analyzing a woody plant is to check how firmly it was set into the soil to check for root problems.

I was dismayed by how loosely it appeared to be and wiggled/rocked in the ground way more than I thought it should.

Well only first full season and I thought that I can't do anything until the end of summer anyways, so made a mental note to check it later on.

When I initially planted it, I used a spot where a peony had earlier died, the ground was grass less because it had a 32" diameter ring of 5" deep lawn edging around it.

I left the lawn edging for the hydrangea, so I didn't have to deal with grass infringing into the root ball and that was the same reason I put the edging around the peony in the first place.

I thought about that possibly being a problem but only the second season in the ground and wouldn't the roots simply grow under the lawn edging and continue on into the lawn?

Today 8-27-2025,

I tried to wiggle the base of the H. diamant rouge by hand and was surprised to find that it was way solider than it was last spring. Maybe not 'rock solid' but solid enough to dispel my fears.

So, I thought I'd still remove the lawn edging. I had to dig a little sod around the outside of the ring to get it out and when I did, I was astonished to find circling roots following the inside of the lawn edging.

One root was so long (4ft.) it had traveled halfway around the ring already!

(brown slender root going down middle of picture).

It didn't appear that any of the roots went under the edging, but I really didn't want to disturb too many roots so didn't dig down any more than I needed to remove the plastic ring.

Filled the trench around the root mass with pure native topsoil (no grass roots) to give the hydrangea roots a chance to grow out before any competition from the grass occurs.

So, you go in thinking one thing and find something totally different. ;-)

This is the 3rd plant of 4 that I had yet to check for root problems this season.

I'm not sure if I disturbed the blooms by what I did but they were small and had erratically opened and each at different intervals so not great at all.

eta:

I think that the poor blooms can be attributed to the dry weather since the beginning of August,

I did water some but apparently not nearly enough. But I'm not too worried, I know it takes a while for a plant like this to become fully established.