Gardenia plants are poorly

lovebug_rita

Hi I have a few small Gardenia plants but they are looking really poorly at the moment. The leaves have some sort of white powder on them and are gradually gowing yellow/brown and falling off. There also seems to be really tiny cobwebs of some sort on them but I cant seem any bugs as such on them.

Please could someone advice on what i should try to treat them with?
thanks in advance :-)

westiea

Hi

Gardenias are notoriously hard to grow!

It sounds like you have Red Spider Mite, and powdery mildew.

The mite breed in the same conditions your Gardenia loves i.e. high humidity,but has no natural predators inside - Wipe leaves clean as best as possible then spray it with a pesticide. Best to treat all plants in the vicinity so no reinfection occurs.

The Mildew,is usually causerd by the leaves getting damp, make sure you water from below only not on top. Again wipe leaves clean as best you can then spray it with a fungicide.

Make sure it gets a lot of sun in the day,and not too cool in the night. Sit it on a saucer filled with pebbles and water (keeps humidity high around plant without compost getting too wet). Feed every 2 weeks at the moment. If its a warm dry day stick it outside to get some air circulatiuon - that reduces the chances of mildew.

lovebug_rita

thanks so much - they were doing so well and now they look awful :-( hope they perk up after this - thanks!