Look closely at smooth hydrangea and you’ll find a different kind of beauty: a gathering of tiny, fertile white flowers, sometimes edged with a few larger, showier sterile blossoms.
This is the straight species, Hydrangea arborescens—the wild relative of familiar garden selections such as ‘Annabelle’. [1a] Its flower clusters are flatter and less densely packed than those big white garden snowballs. [1b, 1c]
Native to the eastern United States, this deciduous shrub grows along wooded slopes, ravines and streambanks. [1d] In a garden, its modest stature—typically about three to five feet tall and wide [1e]—suits a woodland edge or a relaxed group beneath taller plants. The flowers attract pollinators, and its foliage supports the hydrangea sphinx moth. [1f]
Give it moist, well-drained soil and partial shade. [1g] It flowers on the current season’s growth; [1h] remove weak or damaged stems in early spring. [1i] Its white flowers do not turn blue when the soil becomes more acidic. [1j]
