In a response to a question concerning blue in hydrangea's, David J. Bockman
so wisely remarked:


"David J Bockman" wrote
inmessage ...

You might be battling a high pH soil, in which case long term acidifying
would mean laying down powdered aluminum sulphate (I like straight iron
sulphate), along with an acidifying fertilizer like Espoma's Hollytone.

The coffee grounds can only help.



"I planted a couple Nikko blue hydrangeas two years ago, but the flowers
haven't been blue (they were more of a pinkish white). I watered them with
an aluminum sulfate solution this spring and last fall to try to make the
flowers blue this year. Now, I'm considering adding old coffee grounds to
the soil -- Will this counteract the aluminum sulfate, or will it help to
make the flowers blue?

Thanks in advance for any help you can provide.



Suzanne "





Ok Dave, since you've got yer stuff together on the fertilizers, I need to
ask YOU a question.........my friend whose been in landscaping for years now
(a couple of decades) has recently been fiddling around with mixing Ironite
that Lowe's sells in granular form (a handful per container, or mixing soils
and some ironite up with the soils and planting perennials). She convinced
me to use it myself when I saw the massive improvement in the size and
health of her plants in just a year. If I'm only using this in my
perennials (the bag says NO BURN) why will they grow lush and larger? I have
red clay soil and I've ammended with compost, worm soil, and cheap topsoil.

I've done a search in my gardening books and nothing comes up on IRONITE.
If you saw the results that Karol had with bareroot plants that were just 18
months old, you'd have converted to Ironite in the soil too.
I appreciate the trouble you're going to on this. I need to learn as much
as possible, and before I start mixing massive amounts of soils and Ironite
I need to make sure it won't have long term effects on my plants and
possibly us. If it's safe, just let me know....
madgardener still learning about this whole thing