Summer_Squash, it appears to only be the old leaves. The further down the vine I go, the better the leaves look. I just checked. Some of the decaying leaves do also have yellow spots on them. And I found two very small but already dead/yellow fruits. This post was edited by wstoutamire on Wed, Jun 25, 14 at 13:41

Thanks for all the suggestions. The female holly was dead, dead, dead. No dormancy. Everything very brittle (ie branch would snap in half) and no signs up life when I dug it up. I actually have never paid much attention to the holly, as it was always very self-sufficient. A little Holly Tone in the Spring, as advised from our local expert gardener we hired when we first moved in. The anti-fungal was used well after the dying was happening. It was organic and on the advice of my local nursery, which has an arborist on staff. I didn't bring a twig, though, so he was only guessing. I guess I'll bring a twig into him to take a look at. Would just hate to lose my male holly. Thanks again. S

You said "the water goes straight though" That's because the potting mix dried out and pulled away from the sides. To re-hydrate it, set in a tub of water, deep enough to submerge the rootball. Soak for max 20 minutes, then remove from the water.

I usually check the soil with a finger - 1/2 inch deepness, if it is wet I never water the plant. I use tap water after 24 hours keeping it in an opened bottle. In this location (Arizona) there are a lot of salts in tap water. What moisture levels are in the top inches of the pot are not a reliable indicator of what moisture levels are deep in the pot. The lower 6" of a 10" pot can be 100% saturated when the top couple of inches are bone dry. The best method of telling if a larger planting needs water is by using a "tell". See something I wrote at the end of this reply. There are good reasons not to let your water sit or rest before you use it to water. 1) It doesn't do any good insofar as allowing monochloramine or fluoride to gas off. 2) Water that's cool (even cold) and fresh from the tap holds much more dissolved oxygen, a notable plus for root health. Unfortunately, I don't have a water softener. Perhaps that's unfortunate for people, but fortunate for plants. The Na (sodium) in the salt used in the exchange for carbonates normally leads to lethal Na levels in the soil solution. I really don't know if the pot has a drain hole (I just take care of the plant temporally) - it's really difficult to check - the plant is approximately my height. But definitely no cache pot for collecting effluent is available. Large plantings without drain holes are decidedly difficult to grow in, so it would be best for whomever owns the plant to make sure it has one. No drain = absolute certainty all salts from tapwater and fertilizer solutions accumulate and remain in the soil. The normal outcome is loss of viability of whatever happens to be growing in the pot. It doesn't matter if the planting has a cache pot or a collection saucer to collect the water, there should be no pathway by which the effluent that collects below the pot can make its way back into the soil. The purpose of watering to beyond the point of soil saturation is to flush salts out of the soil. Providing a pathway by which those salts can reenter the soil solution defeats the purpose of trying to flush salts from the soul before they accumulate to unhealthy/toxic levels. ..... not sure I can help much more because of the unknowns. Using a 'tell' Over-watering saps vitality and is one of the most common plant assassins, so learning to avoid it is worth the small effort. Plants make and store their own energy source – photosynthate - (sugar/glucose). Functioning roots need energy to drive their metabolic processes, and in order to get it, they use oxygen to burn (oxidize) their food. From this, we can see that terrestrial plants need air (oxygen) in the soil to drive root function. Many off-the-shelf soils hold too much water and not enough air to support good root health, which is a prerequisite to a healthy plant. Watering in small sips leads to a build-up of dissolved solids (salts) in the soil, which limits a plant's ability to absorb water – so watering in sips simply moves us to the other horn of a dilemma. It creates another problem that requires resolution. Better, would be to simply adopt a soil that drains well enough to allow watering to beyond the saturation point, so we're flushing the soil of accumulating dissolved solids whenever we water; this, w/o the plant being forced to pay a tax in the form of reduced vitality, due to prolong periods of soil saturation. Sometimes, though, that's not a course we can immediately steer, which makes controlling how often we water a very important factor. In many cases, we can judge whether or not a planting needs watering by hefting the pot. This is especially true if the pot is made from light material, like plastic, but doesn't work (as) well when the pot is made from heavier material, like clay, or when the size/weight of the pot precludes grabbing it with one hand to judge its weight and gauge the need for water. Fingers stuck an inch or two into the soil work ok for shallow pots, but not for deep pots. Deep pots might have 3 or more inches of soil that feels totally dry, while the lower several inches of the soil is 100% saturated. Obviously, the lack of oxygen in the root zone situation can wreak havoc with root health and cause the loss of a very notable measure of your plant's potential. Inexpensive watering meters don't even measure moisture levels, they measure electrical conductivity. Clean the tip and insert it into a cup of distilled water and witness the fact it reads 'DRY'. One of the most reliable methods of checking a planting's need for water is using a 'tell'. You can use a bamboo skewer in a pinch, but a wooden dowel rod of about 5/16” (75-85mm) would work better. They usually come 48” (120cm) long and can usually be cut in half and serve as a pair. Sharpen all 4 ends in a pencil sharpener and slightly blunt the tip so it's about the diameter of the head on a straight pin. Push the wooden tell deep into the soil. Don't worry, it won't harm the root system. If the plant is quite root-bound, you might need to try several places until you find one where you can push it all the way to the pot's bottom. Leave it a few seconds, then withdraw it and inspect the tip for moisture. For most plantings, withhold water until the tell comes out dry or nearly so. If you see signs of wilting, adjust the interval between waterings so drought stress isn't a recurring issue. Al