Lime Lite is in bad shape! Please help!

8 years ago

last modified: 8 years ago

I bought a moisture meter yesterday and I've been over watering! It's WET and WET today. I've removed mulch, dug her up to look at roots (should have taken pic) but I don't know what to do. I mixed some dry planting soil in and put her back in the ground, turning dead side away from sun. I read to cut off rotted roots but want opinions first. She was blooming so lovely and still has one almost full bloom on her good side. The other full bloom you see is from the other LL. Wilting is not going away in the evening. This is the reason I got the moisture meter. Please help.

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Comments (5)

luis_pr
8 years ago
last modified: 8 years ago
It does not look too bad in the picture so I would not panic; you should have seen my mopheads this am. In the day, I would expect some wilting on new LLs and with 99-100 temps. The blooms are getting old and when they do, they turn other shades of green with pink/etc.

Wilting 24/7 indicates that either the soil is dry or it is getting too much water so make sure you do not keep the soil always wet as this makes it easy to get root rot. A little wet now and then is ok (> week of wet and I would worry).

Check the condition of the leaves in the morning and not at night since they sometimes take a while to recover. My mopheads this AM looked wilted so I had to water them by hand. It is just plum too hot here in Texas so the leaves during the summer will wilt in the day, especially recently planted shrubs. Next year, it should behave better.

Investigate why the soil is wet so much... to confirm your overwatering suspicion. An ck why the soil may not be draining well.

I drip water 1.5 gallons on my LL per watering. Twice a week. Sometimes every other Sundays, I will also water by hand as drip does not do a good job on roots that are in the top 4".
Sandra Matula
Original Author
8 years ago
Thank you for the info! This morning they looked just as bad unfortunately. I do not yet have a drip so I've been hand watering with a hose. The roots look pretty bad many many dead. Do you think I should remove all the blooms so she puts all energy in repairing roots? I'll sacrifice her beauty for a while if I can save her.
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Hello, wv2ga. If the leaves are turning brown from the edges, it may be in need of more water. Wilting indicates that the leaves are loosing moisture faster than the roots can absorb it so make sure they have enough moisture (at least a gallon per watering) and 3-4" of mulch. If the location is windy, it will make wilting episodes more common. Hydrangeas here are wilting too. It is way too hot. About 100 degrees so there is not much one can do. When wilting episodes strike, try to contain the urge to water them. If the wilting episode seems extreme, give them about 1 gallon of water starting around the rootball and moving outwards. otherwise, insert a finger into the soil to check for soil moisture. Water if it feels alsmost dry or dry. Otherwise, wait until next morning. In many cases, they recover on their own by next morning. Keep an eye on the leaves color change. If you notice that the leaf veins remain dark as the leaves turn light yellow to yellow then your soil is too alkaline and it needs to acidified by adding any one of these: garden sulphur, green sand, iron sulfate, aluminum sulfate or iron chelated soil acidifying liquids. Apply them per label directions until the problem goes away. The liquid compounds work faster. When applying any of these, water the soil when done. On the other hand, if the color change shows that the leaves in direct contact with the sun are turning light yellow-green or all yellowish -including the leaf veins- then that suggests that your plant is getting too much sun and some protection of some type is in order quickly. You can install shade cloth or make your own shadow producing contraption. I had this happen once when some storms damaged the tree that provided shade to one hydrangea and it was exposed to too much sun. I try not to expose hydrangeas to sun startiong between 11am-12pm. You may want to try that too since you (think: Atlanta) and I (think: Dallas) are -more or less- in the same latitude. This can now be a problem because the shrubs are getting larger than in years past. Luis
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luis_pr
8 years ago
Removing blooms is what many people like to do on year one with all kinds of plants. I do not see a problem with that myself either. Make sure you give them about 1.5 gallons of water with the hand watering and not too much after that. But the only area that looks wilted is the top of the picture so you could leave the other unwilted stems with blooms.
Sandra Matula thanked luis_pr
Sandra Matula
Original Author
8 years ago
Going to try it. Thank you so much!
Steppskie (5a/b IN)
8 years ago
Since we are talking about helping this plant in its new home, I wanted to mention that a limelight can get very large, 6 feet wide, large. If you are considering lifting it again, at all, you may want to move it further way from that lovely brick ledge.

Not sure of the site entirely, but it will grow onto and maybe even over that ledge in just a year or two.
Sandra Matula thanked Steppskie (5a/b IN)

Lime Lite is in bad shape! Please help!

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Lime Lite is in bad shape! Please help!

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