By Clyde Noel

Town Crier correspondent

Your grandmother and great-grandmother loved hydrangeas in the summer and now you can go to Draeger’s and Safeway supermarkets and find them for sale at Christmas time along with poinsettias.

The big-flower hydrangea are a welcome attraction in July and August, but now people use them as centerpieces for Christmas decoration. A little expensive this time of year, but the large green leaves appeal because they are almost tropical in appearance.

The flowers are long-lasting clusters of white, pink, red, and under certain conditions, blue. A sales clerk at the Los Altos Safeway said the store sells a lot of white hydrangea because people mix them with red poinsettias for color around the room.

“Another reason people buy hydrangea this time of year is they can replant them in the garden for summer bloom, while poinsettia take too much special care before they turn color the following season,” the sales clerk said.

Sunset magazine says gardeners don’t realize that hydrangeas bloom on two-year-old-wood. To make sure you get plenty of flowers, hold off on pruning beyond the occasional snip to shape the plant.

There are shade-loving hydrangeas (macrophylla) and sun-loving varieties (paniculata), but most hydrangeas sold in supermarkets are shade-loving.

Florist plants are usually French hybrids, 1-3 feet tall, with larger flowers than the garden variety. Florists also grow French hybrids as pot plants and control flower color by controlling soil mix.

Buy a blue hydrangea from the florist and when you plant it in neutral soil the plant will turn pink.

Plants can be made blue by soil application of aluminum sulfate. They can be kept red or deep red by liming or applying superphosphate to the soil. Treatment must be started long before the plant is expected to bloom.

In cemeteries across the country you will find paniculata grandiflora grown as a shrub or a small tree in full sun and usually white in color.

If you’re looking for hydrangea to plant in the garden, try the oak leaf variety. It has long leaves (8 inches) that turn bronze or crimson in the fall. In June the clusters are white and the plant takes full sun.

The holidays are a great time to look at spring and summer flowers florists grow out of season.