By far and away, the very best product to get rid of fungus gnats is Gnatrol. You can purchase this on amazon.com. Organic and very, very effective. Just be sure to treat all your indoor plants, as they can be living in other indoor plant soils, and will return to your citrus if you don't treat everything. I would say the loss of leaves is probably more due to not enough light. I would provide additional artificial light for your trees. And, I would switch to DynaGro Foliage Pro for your fertilizer. Using in-ground granular fertilizers in container citrus can cause salts build up, and cause burning. Patty S.

Hi again, Ok, I contacted my local Cornell Extension, and they cannot do the test (they don't have that equipment) - it must be mailed to the Cornell Plant Disease Diagnostic clinic. I explained what happened, and she does not think it is Phytophthora, because according to her the soil would have to be excessively wet "almost like a bog." She does not think it is worth having tested because they have been dead too long and other organisms may screw up the test. Now, everything I have read says it spreads in "wet" soil (not just "almost like a bog"), and that one of the main ways it is spread to new areas is through nursery stock. She thinks the trees "Just didn't take." Very odd, in my opinion. The fee for each test is $40, and each test (mold, fungus, nematodes) is a separate fee. I don't think it is worth it, since it has been too long. I'm going to call the nursery and explain what happened and ask them if they have certification proving they do not have Phytophthora. I already removed the mulch and soaked it in a 10% bleach solution, and when I removed the soil from the hole there were at least 100 earthworms in it, so I picked them all out and relocated them to another area of my yard that is pure clay that I've been amending with leaves and pine needles (nothing planted there yet). I'll soak the soil that was immediately around the tree in bleach, and then till the rest of the area and add a lot of compost and some sand for drainage. The plum was already planted above-grade, but I'll plant the mulberry even higher. I figure better safe than sorry and bleaching it is the safe way to go (my book on diseases says to throw the soil out - but that will only spread it to a new area!).

I can tell you what has worked for me ... I'm not too far away from you in So Cal, either, so we have similar growing conditions. First, I will say that some cuttings are much more difficult to root successfully than others, and to a (sometimes frustrating) extent, every cultivar can be different. That said, I have had my best successes using the following methods: Callousing the cutting: 1. First, I look at what callous is or is not there already. Depending on the size of the cutting and the quality of the cut/callous (like, is the pith receding a lot? Have the cambium and pith pulled away from one another so there is a gap?), I may recut and re-callous the cutting. If the cutting is small, stressed, really wrinkly, etc., I will do my best NOT to recut, in order to preserve whatever energy is left in the cutting. If the cut looks messy, separated, etc., then I usually will recut. 2. After this step, I dip the end of the cutting in a rooting hormone (I use Clonex, others use Dip-N-Grow). Sometimes I wait for the latex to stop flowing (a few hours) before doing this if I have just recut. Other times, I'm lazy and don't wait. I'm not sure it makes a difference. 3. Then, I take a small plastic storage bin (I use one not much bigger than most cuttings. I got it at Target, I think) and fill it with fresh mulch, which is usually somewhat damp when you take it out of the bag for the first time. I bury the entire cutting in the mulch, and put a little more on top. I don't bother covering the plastic bin. 4. I leave it alone for approx 2 weeks. I have also tried wrapping the fresh-cut end in plastic wrap for a week (usually because I'm travelling with a fresh cutting) - this has worked, too, but I haven't done it enough times to say if it's better than the mulch method. Rooting the cutting: 1. I use coir from Gardener's Supply (Eco-coir potting mix), because it has been rinsed and is ready to use (just add water!): http://www.gardeners.com/buy/eco-co-coir-potting-mix/40-136.html If you use coir from some place else (like buying it in the reptile bedding section at PetSmart), be sure to wash it first to get rid of the salts in it. I follow the directions for prepping the coir, although I use a little less water than recommended. You want the coir to be pretty damp, but not so wet that water drips out when you squeeze it in your hand. 2. I then get a plastic baggie (quart size has worked fine for me), and fill it with approx 2/3 - 3/4 coir and 1/3 to 1/4 perlite. I don't measure, I just grab handfuls of each and mix them in the bag. 3. Stick the calloused end of the cutting in the bag! Leave enough space at the top for the bag to be sealed. I use cheap electrical tape to wrap the top of the bag. Be sure to press out as much of the air as you can before sealing the top. 4. I leave the bagged cuttings in the garage. They need heat more than light, and these super hot temps that we've been having have actually made the garage perfect for this. You should see some condensation in the bags after a bit - this is normal and is what you want. I've gotten roots as early as 1.5 weeks (from a really large cutting that I'd been trying to root for 18 months!!!), and other cuttings are slower, although I usually see something by 3-4 weeks. So far, though, everything has rooted, including a 3" Celadine tip that I bag rooted just to see what would happen. 5. After there are a lot of roots in the bag, I carefully cut the bag away and pot up, trying not to disturb the plant as much as possible. I water a little, then let the planting mix dry out before watering again. I put them in filtered light, too, since they've been in a dark garage for weeks. I really like bag rooting because you can see what's going on down there, and aren't just looking at leaf growth as an indicator of root growth. Mike Atkinson has a great short tutorial on bag-rooting on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_QKS_pasH4

Some time back I noticed one of my older trees would naturally drop under canopy branches in the same way. Somehow the trunk would wall off the branch as if it knows it provides no benefits to the tree and it would start to shrivel from the bottom to the tip. No long term ill effects. I'm not very familiar with "leaf hoppers" so I'll just generalize pest treatment best practices. Do the best you can to spray the canopy from as many angles as possible particularly from below. Most people are comfortable using a Bayer 3 in 1 spray that can connect to the hose. You can thin some branches if you want for shape purposes. I really have a hard time making the too much water connection. It's too mature to be damaged by water except trying to grow it in the middle of a lake. I have seen trees so routinely wet they are covered in lichen and moss. Ugly gnarled and stunted but still alive.