Greetings, Those glazed pots look nice but can be "tricky" with the water they retain...They dont "breathe" for one thing----which can be ok if water retention is what you want for the plant, BUT you MUST water it alot less than a clay pot for most plants. I have an outside Gardenia doing great for 3 years now: It stays on the northern side of my back patio and dosen't get to cold in the winter. It only gets morning sun up until about noonish. It is in a clay pot so its' roots can breathe and dry out between waterings. I water FROM THE BOTTOM most of the time and then from the top every 3rd or so waterings. Its' Breathable Clay pot requires a bottom placement/water holder thingy with about 1+1/2 inh lip (15 inch diameter perhaps). This operation works great for my Gardenia! ***There is also a simple gardening tool (probe) for potted plants,that I use,for measuring the amount of moisture in the various parts of the pot/plant. It gets rid of the need for guessing the moisure content! Also you can be precise on the delivery of moisture from the bottom or even to a specific part of the pot/plant, with it. It costs about 3or4 $, and nothing more than a foot long probe with a "wet/moist/dry meter" on top of it. ....I have some Frangipanis in pots too------if your interested. Regards, mike

Yep, I wee on mine as well (not even watered down as some forums suggest - just straight on). I also wee on my murraya. (and no my roses didnt like the wee either - but they LOVE the tea bags I give them). The other thing I've found that cures the gardenia leaves from turning yellow is, if in a pot, put it on crocks (so the water drains really well), and then water daily. serious. they love the daily watering. I barely even use epsom salts anymore with this crock - daily water - and wee recipe - and i've never had yellow leaves on my gardenia since. Aaaand for further thriving i recommend giving it diluted worm juice - just sends new growth out like there's no tomorrow.

This is why all my Gardenias died. They are one tough customer! I have two Vietnamese Gardenias and they started to get yellow leaves on the bottom too. So yesterday I potted them in the ground. If they die, then I give up! There are just too many other fragrant plants out there that I don't want to waste any more time, energy and money on something that I simply cannot grow! Good luck with yours. Hopefully you can diagnosis the problem and correct it before it's too late.

This is a very interesting thread. But, it sounds almost like directions for mixing up a witch's brew. (No criticisms intended here, just an observation.) At the risk of sounding like a know it all, I would like to tell you all what Steve Bender says in The Southern Living Garden Book about Gardenias. If I were you, I would listen to him. My thoughts are the ones in parentheses. Listen to those only if you want to. Gardenias need good drainage, acid soil, and lots of organic matter. (This is me now: you can provide all of these things by working a couple shovels full of peat moss into the hole at the time of planting.) Plant them "high in the hole" (If you're planting a potted plant from the nursery, let the surface of the soil in the pot be a good inch higher than the surface of the ground you're planting it in. Mound soil from the ground up and around the root ball. This planting technique helps meet that good drainage requirement.) and do not let them be crowded by other plants. (This is very important! They need a good two to two and a half feet of space on all sides of their trunk. If they're too crowded they will have yellow leaves, develop sooty mold, and have even more insects than usual.) They will sulk and have yellow leaves if they have to compete with tree roots. (I have personally experienced this and it is gospel.) Mulch the plants instead of cultivating around them (their roots are near the surface and will be damaged by alot of cultivating.). Feed every 3 to 4 weeks during the growing season with an acid fertilizer (Miracle Gro or Holly Tone would be two), fish emulsion (plants like this like no other fertilizer I have ever tried in 30 plus years of gardening) or blood meal. They need regular water (an inch a week) and appreciate shade in the afternoon, but will do fine in full sun if all their other needs are met. It is true that gardenias seem to be insect magnets, but they are so tough, you can usually get away with doing nothing, allowing nature (ladybugs, for instance) to do its job, as long as you have followed the above directions. (This assumes that you don't use alot of insecticides that kill the bugs that want to be your friends.) Horticultural oil is a good pest control, but you are only supposed to apply it in the wintertime! It could do real harm to your plants in the heat of summer. For those of you that have lost some shrubs, you should know that Gardenias are among the easiest plants to propagate on the planet. Take stem cuttings right now (July-August), and you can have them rooted in two weeks in a glass of water or stuck into moist soil in the shade. In a year, they'll be at least as large as nursery stock plants. While all these ideas for Epsom Salts, etc. have some value, the truth is, you are just guessing at what your plants really need. It is cheaper in every way (time, trouble, and money) to start with the good solid fundamentals of gardening and to follow the advice of the experts. If that fails, get a soil test for $5.00. Then you'll really KNOW what you plants need. If you live in the south, chances are if you follow Steve Bender's guidelines, you won't need anything else to grow gorgeous gardenias. And by the way, if you don't have the Southern Living Garden Book, you can get one for the price of two shrubs (that might die without good information) or three containers of fertilizer. I couldn't garden without it myself. (And no, I don't work for Oxmoor house.:)