Hi Rose, its quite possible too much water. Here near chicago its been warm and i notice lowest leaves are similar as your description. In my case its the water coming out of watering can and or hose hitting the lowest leaves each day sometimes resting on top of soil thats doing it for me. Martin Chicago Ebay ID - Dieseler6z92 Member- Garden Web, Figs4Fun, Friends of The Fig Society

I doubt you have a disease per se - plant diseases tend to be rather specific to individual plants rather than widespread throughout a garden. For example, rhododendron problems generally will not affect laurels, madrone diseases are not common to magnolias, etc. And ivy is virtually disease-free!! It is far more likely that there is some deficiency or other problem with the soil itself. Poor drainage, chemical contamination, excessive compaction, lack of fertility - any of these can create sufficient stress in otherwise healthy plants so that they perform poorly, display off-color foliage and/or become susceptible to insects or common fungal issues that are secondary to the primary problem. Do any of these things srike a chord? Have you had a soil test done? Anything different with the garden beginning late last year - a different type of mulch used, a spraying service, perhaps the use of weed 'n feed products on your lawn, neighbors using pesticides, construction activity that could disturb roots or alter drainage? Unfortunately, soil issues are not easily diagnosed just from photographs, although may provide some indication. You might be better served by hiring a consultant to view your garden personally and evaluate the situation. A local nursery may have a CPH on staff that could offer such a service or direct you to someone with these qualifications or you could inquire at your local extension office. Feel free to email me the photos if you like (email address on member page) and I'll give it my best shot, but based on what you describe, I truly think a personal, onsite evaluation is your best bet for getting to the root (no pun intended!) of the problem.

Blackspot. The forum has LOTS of posts about it. Some roses are more susceptible than others. You can spray but you have to repeat every week or whenever the directions say. You must also collect and discard all affected leaves. The spray doesn't get rid of the problem. Instead, it protects the new growth.

Why not post a few more pictures including one of the soil and one of the whole plant, and tell us how you water and what kind of light the plant gets? I suggest you find out exactly what's wrong before doing anything else. Fortunately there are a lot of people here who have lots of experience raising all sorts of plants and dealing with just about any nasty thing that can harm them. I have a few guesses, but a little more information will help folks figure out what's going on and the best way to treat it. Fungus gnats live in the soil, so you have to do something to the soil to get rid of them. I treat them by periodically getting all of my plants to dry out at the same time, because they can't survive without wet soil. I've heard of people getting good results by dissolving part of a mosquito dunk in water and then watering lightly with it. I'm sure someone will pop in and give you some details. Often, the kind of wilting and yellowing leaves I see in your picture are signs of watering issues, and usually it's overwatering. Many people don't believe it's possible, but watering while the soil at the bottom of the pot is still wet keeps the rootlets that carry water to the plant from breathing and ends up killing them, making it look like the plant is thirsty when the problem is drowned roots. I can tell my plants are starting to get dry from their weight, but I check the soil moisture daily with a sharpened wooden dowel (just switched from a cheap moisture meter) stuck all the way to the bottom of the pot, and don't water until the first time the tip feels dry. At that point there's still moisture in the soil, but if I wait any longer the plant will wilt. At that point I water thoroughly until a lot of water has drained from the bottom of the pot and let the pot drain thoroughly. There are ways of helping this along, but we can get to that later. Best of luck!