Pinky Winky has gone Prime! One of my all-time favorite hydrangea paniculata varieties, Pinky Winky is now being offered as Prime. This means you can now choose Pinky Winky or Pinky Winky Prime hydrangea for your landscape or pollinator habitat, as I will explain. Your first question is what the difference is, and that would be size.
It is larger, reaching 6 to 9 feet tall and as wide. And as Proven Winners states, the blooms are massive. When August rolls around and butterfly season is peaking, Pinky Winky and Pinky Winky Prime stand ready to supply the nectar.
After watching panicle hydrangeas for years, I can tell you that while they are all beautiful, they are not all the same when it comes to bees and butterflies. Pinky Winky and now Pinky Winky Prime are at the top. Many will find this odd, so let me explain.
First, know that I am not talking about larval host plants. I’m not talking milkweeds, passion flowers, dill, tulip trees or pipevines. I am talking about nectar plants.
You are probably thinking you’ve been growing hydrangeas for years and never seen a pollinator. I will be quick to say that’s OK; we need shrubs with beautiful flowers in the landscape. Pinky Winky and Pinky Winky Prime are good examples.
A close examination will show they have large sterile flowers that give us the proverbial show and go in the landscape, the “wow factor,” so to speak. Among those sterile flowers are tiny fertile flowers. Now, a lot of literature will call the sterile on.
