Hello everyone! It is really good to be back on here, now that I have found a little time! I hope that posting in this forum with all of this is okay, the majority of it is all container plants, so I think it should be okay! First of all, I want to throw a very large shout out to Laura, who has very kindly sent me some plumeria cuttings, with the assistance of Al! Thank you to both of you! I am getting leaves on the cuttings now, which is super exciting! I will continue to post pictures of how they are doing, so long as I can submit them! They are beautiful! I also have some pictures of my Gardenia that I have questions for al or anyone who knows more about the gritty mix than I do! About two months ago, I found a lovely gardenia topiary on sale and thought I should take it home to once again try and grow it :) It looked terrible after about three weeks, and so I thought I should change the soil out. After a root wash I discovered that more than half of the roots were no longer white, but mostly brown. There were large white roots however, so I thought I would try the gritty mix for it. After having made a very large batch of the mix, I ran out of the granite chips ( my source was poultry gravel, I think my manna-pro) having already washed the roots of the Gardenia, i needed to act quickly, and found a bag of concrete gravel ( just the rocks, no concrete or anything in it) and used that in the gritty mix. It is about 50% proper gritty mix, and the rest is gritty mix made with repti-bark, turface and the gravel. They gardenia did not wilt at all after changing soil and I was happy with it until about a month ago... I used dyna-gro with the waterings and still it has been dropping leaves. Starting from the middle of the plant, working out they turn yellow, many with brown tips. I also tried adding an additional iron fertilizer at the recommended amount, but nothing seems to prevent this. What is strange is that the rest of the leaves that remain green look very healthy to me, and it even has a few new leaves coming out. I water it about three times a week if the weather is warm, this last week we had days over 100 like many people, and I watered it every other day then, because I suspect the larger pebbles are preventing the gardenia from holding onto nutrients and water.... I am posting pictures of the gritty mix, the gardenia, and some various other plants which I hope bring more enjoyment than the gardenia. I have some grapes in containers, Chardonnay, Riesling and some others that are in the middle of an experiment :) Having crossed them with American type grapes like La Crosse, I will see if I can get them to Germinate later on. Also are some pictures of the rest of my garden, and my favorite Japanese Maple, Osakazuki sunset, and a new arrival bloodgood. I do not suspect the bloodgood will make it through the harsh Wisconsin winter, but the Osakazuki has done fine for three years, so we will see!

Thanks in advance for your help!

wiguy12

Here is a link that might be useful: garden pictures