Pinky Pollen Ring™ Smooth Hydrangea

A pink lacecap smooth hydrangea, which puts real pollen and nectar on a plant most people buy for looks. Hydrangea arborescens 'SMHALP', sold as Pinky Pollen Ring, carries a ring of showy pink sterile florets around a center of small fertile flowers, and it is those fertile flowers in the middle that bees actually feed on. It grows 4 to 5 feet tall and wide in part shade with four to six hours of sun, mostly before midday, hardy from Zone 3 through Zone 8.

Bloom starts in early summer and holds for weeks, the flat heads carried above blue-green foliage. The pink deepens as the flowers mature.

Most smooth hydrangeas sold today are mopheads, where the showy sterile florets crowd out most of the fertile ones and make it harder for insects to find what they need. A lacecap leaves the fertile center open and accessible, which earned this one a place in the American Beauties native plant collection.

Smooth hydrangea is the group that blooms most reliably in cold gardens. Buds form in spring on the current year's growth, so a hard winter cannot take the display, and soil pH does not change the color. Cut back to about 18 inches in late winter. It wants consistent moisture, tolerates wet ground, and prefers shade from midday on in hot climates.