Why are my flowers...burned?
May 8, 2017 4:40 PM Subscribe
What the heck is wrong with these hydrangeas?
First time owning an actual front yard with a flower bed, we bought 3 hydrangeas a couple weeks ago and they're doing...not great. The leaves on the first one started looking, almost burned? after a couple days, while the other two did better for awhile, now they're both showing the same burned(?) pattern on a couple of the leaves. The first one just keeps looking worse. They get morning sun, house faces east, until around 2-3pm. I watered them some every day for the first week or so, and after that it's been rainy for almost 2.5 weeks.
The soil was more clay/rocky that I expected from a flower bed in a 50 year old house, and I thought that might've been part of the cause for the first one, before the other two started showing symptoyms. So I went back and dug out more of the harder soil and replaced it with another full bad of planter bed soil, but it doesn't seem to have helped any.
Pic 1 - this is the first, worst one
Pic 2 and pic 3 - these two just started showing signs in the past couple days.
First time owning an actual front yard with a flower bed, we bought 3 hydrangeas a couple weeks ago and they're doing...not great. The leaves on the first one started looking, almost burned? after a couple days, while the other two did better for awhile, now they're both showing the same burned(?) pattern on a couple of the leaves. The first one just keeps looking worse. They get morning sun, house faces east, until around 2-3pm. I watered them some every day for the first week or so, and after that it's been rainy for almost 2.5 weeks.
The soil was more clay/rocky that I expected from a flower bed in a 50 year old house, and I thought that might've been part of the cause for the first one, before the other two started showing symptoyms. So I went back and dug out more of the harder soil and replaced it with another full bad of planter bed soil, but it doesn't seem to have helped any.
Pic 1 - this is the first, worst one
Pic 2 and pic 3 - these two just started showing signs in the past couple days.
If it's helpful, hydrangeas are most often subject to cercospora fungal infections. You can look up treatment regimes and go to your local better garden center for further advice and whatever control mechanism(s) you turn to.
posted by Emperor SnooKloze at 7:04 PM on May 8, 2017 [1 favorite]
posted by Emperor SnooKloze at 7:04 PM on May 8, 2017 [1 favorite]
I agree with mud and Emperor that it's probably a fungal infection. While you decide how to treat the infection, you should remove the "burned" looking leaves.
posted by xyzzy at 7:46 PM on May 8, 2017
posted by xyzzy at 7:46 PM on May 8, 2017
Are the plants accessible to an animal that can pee that high?
Hydrangeas ('Annabelle' I assume) are pretty tough plants. But animal urine would scorch leaves in a heartbeat.
posted by greenskpr at 4:29 AM on May 9, 2017
Hydrangeas ('Annabelle' I assume) are pretty tough plants. But animal urine would scorch leaves in a heartbeat.
posted by greenskpr at 4:29 AM on May 9, 2017
I agree that that it looks like some sort of fungus. I also note that you have a lot of wood chip mulch piled up right around the plants! That's not the best for plant health because it can harbor fungal spores. Actual compost as mulch is much better as mulch, especially since you have clay soil. And you don't want the compost or mulch to actually touch the plant, because it needs room to breath.
posted by yarly at 10:14 AM on May 9, 2017
posted by yarly at 10:14 AM on May 9, 2017
Response by poster: It's definitely not animal caused, our dogs are banished to the back yard because they did a number on the front when we bought the place last fall. I reseeded the yard a few weeks ago and they're not allowed out there till it recovers.
I got some fungicide spray and applied it tonight, and moved some of the mulch away from the plant bases. I'm going to keep applying the fungicide until it gets better or dies I guess.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:00 PM on May 10, 2017
I got some fungicide spray and applied it tonight, and moved some of the mulch away from the plant bases. I'm going to keep applying the fungicide until it gets better or dies I guess.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:00 PM on May 10, 2017
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by mudpuppie at 4:56 PM on May 8, 2017 [2 favorites]