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The following question has been answered numerous times but it is worth
repeating. This week we have received numerous requests for help with this
question and similar ones.
Question
I have two hydrangea bushes that are 10 years old and I am only getting
one or two blooms on them. What can I do? Do they need to be pruned or fed
some special fertilizer? Thank you for any help you can give me.
Answer
I suspect you have a florist hydrangea that produces its buds in the fall
for the following year’s blooms. Thousands of these are sold every year as
forced Easter and Mothers Day plants. On many of these the flower buds
will not reliably come through the winter, especially a tough winter. A
few varieties are sufficiently bud hardy to be sold for outdoor use and
will usually bloom satisfactorily, some better than others, depending upon
the toughness of the winter.
As the buds are the least winter hardy part of the plant, it is possible
for all the other parts of the hydrangea to survive the winter and look
fine, even though the flower buds freeze.
I suggest you try the brand new
Hydrangea Endless Summer. It’s from
Minnesota. Endless Summer produces buds in the fall as well as spring and
summer - a unique characteristic. So, even if the fall buds should freeze
you will still have loads of blooms from the continuous production of new
buds.
Pruning or feeding will do nothing; the problem is in the genes of the
plant itself.
Question
Leaves on my Coreopsis Moonbeam are turning whitish. What should I do?
Answer
Your coreopsis has powdery mildew. Almost any fungicide will control the
spread of mildew - especially those labeled for roses. But, don’t expect
the infected leaves to return to green. Only the new growth will be deep
green. If you spray with insecticidal soap, neem oil or horticultural oil
in June, I doubt you will have much of a mildew infection next year.
Interestingly, all of the other closely-related coreopsis verticillata
(thread-leaf coreopsis) varieties seem not to be troubled by mildew and
they live longer also.
Powdery mildew is not life-threatening to the coreopsis, but it is
unsightly. If left untreated, you coreopsis will be somewhat weakened, but
it should return next year.
Question
RABBITS - please help me find something that will keep the rabbits from
eating my flowers. Everyday he eats a couple more. What really makes me
mad is when he just cuts them off and leaves them lay and doesn’t even eat
them. I’ve tried red pepper, moth balls and blood meal.
Answer
Ropel works really well for rabbits. Just spray it on your flowers. How
can you tell you have a “he” rabbit and not a “she” rabbit?
Question
One of my neighbors had me over the other night. He has a yellow flower
that blooms (opens up) in 10 seconds. They think it is a moonflower, have
you ever heard of such a thing. It blooms once and dies overnight.
Answer
I suspect you saw one of the evening primroses “Oenothera glazioviana”.
The blooms are at least tea-cup sized. It grows about 4 feet tall. We list
the plant and it is in stock.
Click here to view Oenothera glazioviana
on our web site.
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