I have to share this funny or maybe not so funny story with you all about my snowball bushes. By the way they were just beautiful this year. When I was a young girl and started to notice foliage and actually care about what things were I dreamed of having a snowball bush at my very own house. We had a family friend who had a huge one and I thought it was just magical in summer with the huge white blooms.
It’s a bush that grows about 2 feet a year and fills out nicely. The ones I have are about 4 years old and so far I haven’t had to trim them. I do know when they need trimming the time to do it is right after they blooms have faded.
Here’s the funny story! Hubby and I hopped into the truck headed to our local creamery for an ice cream cone. It was the perfect lighting and I told hubby to hold up and give me a minute to snap a few photos. Insert eye roll here, he get’s this often and has to pull over the tuck for a photo shoot.
Well I’m here to tell you I’m so glad I snapped a few photos. In the 20 minutes it took us to go get a cone the deer wandered up into the landscaping and ate every bloom off every bush. They must have been laying and waiting for us to leave the driveway; then started the feeding frenzy.
We pulled back into the driveway and I gasped, hubby said what’s the problem. I said look at the snowball bushes, they had big beautiful blooms when we left and now there’s nothing left. The shrubs looked horrible. We started cracking up, but in reality I wasn’t very happy about it. Just when I was ready to sit on the deck and enjoy the view all I had to look at was a mangled shrub.
They didn’t do a very good job of keeping the shrub neatly trimmed but I decided to give the plants time to recover and see if they filled in on their own before I started shaping with my clippers. So far so good they have recovered nicely and you’d never know the deer ate them down to nothing earlier in the season. If you’re ever looking for an easy to grow and maintain shrub that gives off beautiful blooms; the snowball bush is the perfect fit.
Does it need full sun?
Nancy, I have three bushes; two get morning sun and one get’s afternoon sun. So I say no, partial sun will be fine.
Did it rebloom this year??? Mine was eaten to the nub by dear last yaer. This year it is about 6or 7 ft tall, no blooms.
Laura, The deer ate mine this year so I guess I will see if it blooms next year. I bet it will because of the time of year it was eaten. I sure hope yours comes back next year with blooms. I know pruning time is right after it blooms but before winter hits. I bet the deer ate the plant to late in the season so it damaged the upcoming blooms.
Yes it will be interesting to see what next year brings. It has used all it’s energy to put on over 6ft. of growth this season.
Deer seem to only be interested when it is in bloom, at least so far.