This past February it got warm, like really warm. For a week at the end of Feb it was 75 or greater and i think we hit 80 one day. Well all that warmth plus the rain caused all the Hydrangeas in the area to start to leaf out. It had been a fairly warm winter, so i wasn't shocked. All 4 of my bushes broke buds and i had some serious leafage and new growth coming out of the center from the soil line. Well, as most of us know in March it decided to get cold again. I was watching the weather and i saw they were forcasting highs only in the 30's and lows in the low 20's and the colder nights were in the middle teens. Of course we had 20-30 mph winds this whole week. I knew the all the tender leaves would never survive that, and i didn't want to loose all hopes of flowers this year. I also knew that simply covering them with a blanket would not work. So i devised a plan, and went to work. Just before the cold snap, i dug 2 strands of C9 clear Christmas lights. I have the stakes for them as i use them to line the driveway for Christmas. I put the stakes around the crown, for lack of better term, and angled them inward. I spaced them out about every 6 inches around the stalks on each bush. I mounted the lights on the stakes and made sure none were touching the bushes, and adjusted as needed. I then took old moving blanket and draped them over the bushes. I made sure i had a little open space at the bottom so they could breathe. I then covered the moving blankets with some table clothes i got from my grandmother (they are really tacky!) which i then tied down with more stakes or laid a brick on them to keep them put in the wind. I have a solar timer for the lights, and i set it to turn on a dusk and off at dawn. Here is a pic of the final setup, i wish i had taken pics of the lights.
On the first really cold night i went out to check to see if this was even going to work. It was 25 degrees when i went out. I brought a thermometer with me, and i put inside into the open space under all the coverings and waited a minute or two. When i put my hand in there i noticed an immediate difference and how warm it was underneath. I then checked the thermometer and it read a whopping 55 degrees in there! When the weather warmed 4 days later, i uncovered everything and it was all still green! They survived happily in their warm cocoon. I did have to cover with the moving blankets a few more times for light frosts, but it wasn't many. Everyone else's Hydrangeas suffered and lost all their foliage. I now am the only guy in town who has blooming Hydrangeas so far. Here is a picture of them now.
Thanks for reading and letting me brag.
Very nice...