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Ask Anne Clapp - Archives Page 26Return to Ask Anne Clapp Archives - Main Page Question: Creeping Gardenias, how to use Ferti-lome fertilizer? Thank you, Buffy --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Most beetles can be killed with liquid Sevin. Japanese beetles did quite a bit of damage on Yoshino cherries earlier this season. The brown spots and holes may be from a shot hole fungus. It may be too late for a fungicide to help the plants this year but you may want to use one next year to keep the problem under control. It usually does not kill a tree. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: If the metal container is a galvanized metal the coating on the metal may be causing the problem. Another possibility is the roots of the plants are overheating. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: It might be easier to plant them in pots with a good quality potting soil. It is easier to keep them moist and you can wait a bit longer to plant them. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Butterfly bushes prefer growing in full sun. They do not bloom as well with shade. Very few plants are able to live under mature oak trees. They have a very large root system and usually consume most of the water under their canopy. The fruiting of the kiwi depends on the age of the plant when it was purchased. Most plants at least two years old when purchased would have bloomed and fruited by now. Annuals that do well in hot dry conditions include Blanket Flower, Scaevola, Vanhoutte salvia, Sulphur Cosmos, Cleome, Gloriosa Daisy , verbena and Mexican Bush Sage. Perennials for the same conditions are Rudbeckia, Helianthus, Butterfly Weed, Coreopsis, Hardy Ageratum, Purple Coneflower, Gaura, Sedum Spectabile, Powis Castle Artemisia and Mexican Petunia. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Poson ivy doesn't die – it just gets larger and larger. If you use a weed killer to kill off the tops you need to remove the dead plant material – and be careful because the usurol that produces the skin irritation remains in the plant stem for years after it has been killed. The roots also contain the poison. As for the azaleas, they can be transplanted in the fall and will survive being heeled in for a year or so. There are so many new azaleas now that you would probably be wise to plant new azaleas in your landscape rather than trying to move the old ones. Azaleas grow rather quickly so a 3 gallon plant will make a very respectable landscape plant in a couple of years. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: In our area of the world gardenias often do better in the ground than they do in a pot. They thrive in heat and humidity and develop a fairly large root system to support the leaves. The plant will be happier in a pot that is wider than it is deep. In very deep pots a gardenia suffers root rot at the bottom of the container (if water can't flow freely from the bottom of the pot) and dry roots at the top. If you keep the plant outside in warm weather water it frequently, fertilize with a liquid fertilizer for blooming plants at least once a month and try mulching the top of the soil to keep it from drying out as quickly. If you are growing it inside it may not be getting enough light. I am not an experienced gardener and wanted your general yet specific suggestions in order to maintain these lovely palms in a less than tropical environment. Mainly, is there anything special I need to do in regards to frequency of watering, type and frequency of fertilization, and anything else (special insect sprays, type of soil, etc.) you think I may need to do in order to keep these healthy. Additionally, I have noticed a few small brown spots on a few of the fronds – but not all of them. Do I need to trim those fronds off? Also, the tips of some of the fronds are brown? What is causing that, and is there something I can do to assist? Thank you in advance for your assistance, Lynn Anne Clapp: Brown tips on palm fronds may be from water problems (too much and too little), direct air from a home heat vent when they are grown indoors, and chemicals such as fluorine or chlorine in water. Brown spots inside the leaf margin may be from insects or chemicals. The palm needs all its fronds so remove one only when it is badly damaged. A few brown spots are not all that distracting. The palms will have to be brought in before the first frost – and they will need good light inside to stay healthy. The plants need to be watered when the soil dries out and the frequency of watering will change with light, humidity and fertilizer. Don't let the plant sit in a saucer of water for more than a few minutes. For the best information on keeping the plants healthy you may want to ask the advice of the nursery from which you bought them. Anne Clapp: Cut the Paulownia to the ground and paint the fresh stump with Roundup. It may take two sessions of cutting and painting but it is the best method. If the tree bloomed and produced seeds you can expect lots of little seedlings to come up as well. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: It depends on whether the plant is cold hardy in your garden. Some cold hardy vines are left in the ground over the winter with a good layer of mulch over the roots zone. For the tropical jasmine you cut the plant back to a manageable size and bring the potted plant into the house or a frost free area for the winter. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The fruits are mature when you begin to see the stem begin to shrink. If you want the pumpkins at a smaller size they can be picked and cured even if they are not completely mature. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Check the area around the base of the plant for damage from a rabbit, a vole or a chipmunk. There may be a problem with drainage around the plant. If the soil in that area gets dryer or wetter than the surrounding plants it may have leaf drop from drought or too much water. Sometimes one plant does not make good root contact with the soil when it is planted because there are air pockets around the root systems. --------------------------- --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The plant may need a bit of fertilizer with a high middle number (for phosphorus) to help repeat blooming. It may have been too hot for the plant and the soil may be wet one day and dry the next. A three inch layer of good mulch helps keep the roots cool and the moisture content of the soil more constant. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: You may have the weed Oxalis if the plant has a small yellow bloom and a sour taste. Pulling the weeds when the soil is wet is easier than pulling them when it is dry. You could also use a small paint brush to paint weed killer on the leaves of the weed without damaging the flowers. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Crepe Myrtles with black leaves have usually had an infestation of aphids that leave a black residue on the leaves. The aphids can be killed with an insecticide or you can spray the tree with a summer weight horticultural oil which will eventually remove the black leaf coating. The lack of blooms can be caused by the blackened leaves which do not have as much ability to produce food for the plant or caused by too much nitrogen fertilizer. Remember even if you have not fertilized the crepe myrtle the fertilizer from the lawn may have migrated to the area where the crepe myrtle lives. I am not sure what bright color your hydrangeas are supposed to be. There is only one set of blooms on many hydrangeas but the never varieties such as Endless Summer do have continuous bloom through the season. To keep blooms coming the plants need a balanced fertilizer and plenty of water. Soil fertility, too much afternoon sun and lack of water make hydrangeas colors fade and leaves curl. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The red foliage may be from excess sunlight and not enough water. Is it possible the things that look like seedpods are actually the blooms that are beginning to form. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Stella d'Oro is a reblooming daylily cultivar. The color varies with the soil chemistry where it is grown and your more alkaline soils in Arizona would affect the color. Often they do not rebloom if you do not remove the old dead blooms, fertilize the plant about 10 days after the first flush of blooms and keep the plants watered during dry periods. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: You can control Poa Annua that grows in paved areas or gravel driveways but the vinegar will kill other vegetation. There is a pre-emergent herbicide that will keep the seed from germinating this fall if the grass is growing in cultivated soil. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The plants can be pruned back when they are dormant - usually February is a preferred time. One of the local nurseries may be able to identify the plants for you. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The Encore azaleas bloom more than one time a year. They are now widely available and some nurseries will have them in stock this fall. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: I think we got the Bermuda killed in the fescue lawn with TurFlon Ester but they stumped me asking for a product that would kill Bermuda without killing Zoysia. My turf lawn resources list some products for experimental commercial use but none on the homeowner market. Thanks for helping out. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Sometimes flushing the soil with water will reduce the damage but in most cases when the foliage starts turning brown the damage is done. Cutting out the damaged foliage may help reduce the damage. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Washing with soapy water is about the only thing you can do. There may not be too much damage to the crepe myrtle. It must have been very hard for them to get oil on plant foliage from a lawnmower or blower. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Older leaves at the bottom of a rose turn yellow and fall off as part of the natural growth process. While the plants are more drought tolerant they do need to be watered in times of drought and high temperatures. The secret is to water them enough to get water to the deep roots of the plants. They need quite a bit of water when the plants are fertilized so if you have fertilized the plants to stimulate growth and bloom you may need to water the plants more deeply. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: Grasshoppers, beetles, cutworms and some caterpillars eat holes in the leaves of plants. You spray the plants to kill the insects that are eating them. The sprays do not prevent damage because if you have an insect infestation the insects are going to eat a plant. If the plant has been sprayed the insect eats it or you cover the insect with the chemical and it dies so you don't have as many insects to continue the damage. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The problem could be a leaf spot disease. Fungal disease cannot be cured but they are prevented by using a fungicide spray on a regular basis beginning after new growth has developed. Plants that are weakened by poor soil conditions, too much water or too little water, or insect damage are more likely to be infected with a disease. The horse manure is more likely to produce weed problems than the leaf damage. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: It is really not safe to cut back gardenias in the Atlanta and Raleigh areas after August 1 because there is not enough time for new growth to develop and harden off before the first freeze. I prune gardenias in March and cut back early blooms on those that have a long bloom season. --------------------------- Anne Clapp: The white web is probably a mite (a garden spider) that infests gardens in hot humid weather. They have been particularly bad this year. Some organic gardeners control them with a blast of water from the hose to the back side of the leaf to wash off the web and the “critter”. If you prefer to use a pesticide use an “insecticide” that lists mite or spider control as part of the population it controls. |