I've got young feijoas in my garden, and I'm in Wellington, NZ. I will have a look and see if there are signs of disease - if I have something similar then it might make it easier to identify. If it was a root problem, the plant would probably be wilting (despite having enough water). I think that this is probably a leaf fungus based on your description. It is quite likely that the plant had it when you got it, just not so obvious. It may be made worse by the plant being in a protected environment in the greenhouse, although the weather lately has been encouraging to fungal disease. Unless you see the black leaf spots obviously getting larger and joining up, it is probably something that the plant can live with. If it was a root problem, it would be worse. In general feijoas don't have too many problems, so I wouldn't be too concerned. If you can, get it outside so there is more air movement - hopefully not gale force winds though. While feijoas are considered wind-tolerant, they aren't "Wellington wind-tolerant". Try and protect it a bit, especially from the southerly, which is the more damaging wind to plants. Also, don't overwater - if the drainage is good and there isn't a saucer underneath, overwatering probably won't be an issue, just don't let the pot stand in water. Don't overfeed as that can make plants vulnerable to disease as well. While I'm greatful that Wellington doesn't have the temperature extremes of North America and Europe (and I'm especially grateful not to be in the snowstorms I've seen on TV lately), Wellington is having pretty extreme weather right now. My rain gauge recorded more than 80mm of rain over the weekend, with gale force winds and temperatures more typical of winter. Unfortunately, it's just a bad growing season for everything except fungi, and there is a lot more disease around. I've attached a link to my garden blog in case you are interested. It is largely just my personal record of what I plant and what I eat from the garden, but you might find something useful there. Here is a link that might be useful: Wellington edible garden blog

Hi Seil! Thanks so much for your answer and the "tips"! I truly appreciate you taking the time to answer my post. As I said before, I am VERY new to roses and I can use all the help that I can get. I just enjoy them so much. Well, I opened an account on PHOTOBUCKET and uploaded some of the pictures, here is the link: http://s1209.photobucket.com/home/kuhra/recentuploads?view=slideshow Please let me know if you can see the pictures, I certainly hope so. In the pictures, you can see what is going on with the roses. I do think that there is more than one thing going on, like you said a disease and some kind of bug. I took a picture of the "worm/caterpillar" I found in one of the small buds. When I touched it, it curled up like a snake. It is the only one I had found so far but, the bud and the stem where it was, now have this kind of very little dark spots. This morning, I found more fallen leaves at the bottom of the plants. My three yellow ones are almost without any leaves. I also found some kind of "mushy stuff" underneath two of the leaves, in the same plant. I do not know what it was. I took the leaves off the plant. I wanted to ask what should I do: should I remove all the leaves that look sick or should I treat the plants first and see what happens? Please advice. Thanks for the tip about the pots drying out quicker than the ones in the ground. I will be more "generous" with the watering. I have them in pots because when I got them they were so tiny and, like I said, I was just trying to see if I could grow them. Until now they have been doing so well and I am debating whether to keep them in pots or plant them in the ground. We moved into our new house in the spring and we are still trying to "work out the yard", which is kind of small. But, in the from yard there is a very nice space for a nice and roomy flowerbed. My first idea was to plant the roses as "borders for the flowerbed, but if I do that, they will be in "full Florida heat and sun" at least ten hours a day, plus they will get rain on. I just don't know if that would be a good idea. Now, the good thing about this particular location is that during the fall/winter and spring time they would get a lot of sunshine and not as "hot" as during the summer. Right now, I have all of them in a "row" alongside the front of the house, and they are protected from the rain. I have thought about planting them in the same place they are at right now, but I just don't know if they would be "tall" enough to be in the back of the flower bed and if they would stay "short" enough to be "borders". Do you know how big these "minis" can get?. I have checked out the grower's webpage but it only says :"between 12 to 36 inches" that is NOT too helpful. We have had 43 days in a row of over 100 degrees temperature! It has been terrible. But, somehow, the roses and the rest of the plants have made it so far. Hopefully, whatever is "attacking" them can be get under control. It is very interesting your theory about the "spray watering". I think I am going to try that. Like you said, they need all the extra moisture they can get in this heat. Well, I will wait for news from you about the pictures. Again, thanks for your attention and your time. Have a great day, Ana

Well, whether or not they come back l plan on buying about 6 new Cardinal flowers at the upcoming native plant sale, and judging from last year there should be an abundance of L. siphiticas emerging in the garden this year. It's good to roll with what's going on and keep enjoying the marvelous things happening in the plant world. There are a lot of really cool plants that don't have any problem coming back. I had a Dutchmans Briches plant pop up where none were ever planted and I'm thinking it came from a seed that was decades old from a time when they grew in my neighborhood before it was "developed". You are all beautiful!!!!! For Milo and Sudan!!!!!!!

Plants that are struggling seldom give you cuttings that will root, so it's a good bet that any attempt at starting cuttings would be an exercise in futility. New leaves on ficus are typically a lighter shade of green than more mature leaves, and it's not unusual for anthocyanin to express itself (the purple pigment dots) in new leaves. It will fade as the leaves mature. If the image represents the roots current condition, I don't see why your tree shouldn't recover quickly, though you might have slowed recovery down if you didn't keep roots dripping wet throughout the procedure. It only takes a minute or two for fine roots to dry out and die. Closing your tree up with only a low light source might well have caused a corky layer to form where the leaf attaches to the stem. This is called an abscission layer because it's the point at which the leaf abscises (separates from the plant). Once this layer starts to form, it's not reversible, so some of the lower leaves might still be shed. You have a LOT of leaves on the plant for the root system to keep hydrated, so you might also see additional shedding as a drought response due to a compromised root system. This would be do to the repot, but the roots drying out during the repot would add to your shedding woes. You could remove some lower leaves or just let the plant decide what it needs to do to balance the top to what the roots can keep supplied with moisture. As long as you don't over-water (moist or damp as a wrung out sponge is what you should aim for) your plant should do the rest. When you're sure it's pushing new growth, you should start fertilizing. HOW you fertilize, solution strength and frequency, depends on your soil and how you water. Key, is your choice of soil and making sure your watering habits are appropriate. If you're able to water to beyond the saturation point, so you're flushing the soil when you water. without the plant having to suffer because the soil remains soggy for extended periods, you already have half of the battle won. Al