Boy, wasn't this wet cool Spring a killer for black spot? My entire garden was affected; some of my roses, including the defiantly robust Eglantyne still has not fully recovered. Spindly branches with tiny flowers, no leaves on the lower branches... Even my Lavandura Intermedia was affected maybe not by blackspot but by something that isn't good. All its inner, lower leaves turrned yellow, then black. It might still die! Should I prune drastically? I did that to my kumquat and it died anyway! Oh don't get me started on my anxieties about my citrus plants!
Oh yeah, I did the neem oil spray, the Ultrafine oil spray, removing all the affected leaves, even considered something recommended by Yamagami Nursery for $20... eventually used a very dilute chlorine spray. Maybe it was purely fortuitous timing or the chlorine worked, but the black spot seems to be finally defeated. Bleached my gardenia (which lives next to the Eglantyne) but it got over it in a week, thank goodness.
How guilty do I feel to read (now) that black spot doesn't blow in the wind, but the spores were already on the plant since the previous season? I thought f'sure that spraying it frequently should 'wash' it, but now I find that it is distributed by water spray! Duh!
Better start studying up on how to help my roses recover.
1 comment:
I always have a little blackspot, but it never seems to do significant damage, and it's never spread from the roses to anything else. I just discard affected portions, prune for air circulation, and use drip irrigation.
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