Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

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Tlees1611
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Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by Tlees1611 »

Hey guys,
I have a number of pots of gracilis that I am growing before I get a chance to transplant into the ground mid next year. The leaves have started to brown and curl.
Looking for advice, is this due to over watering? Underwatering?
What would you recommend to fix this?
I am feeding it Shirley's #17 lawn food every few weeks.
But want to make sure it is growing strong and healthy, which it doesn't look like.
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needmore
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Re: Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by needmore »

Generally underwatering will result in sudden yellow/oranging of many leaves followed by lots of leaf drop. I assume the lawn fertilizer does not have any weed killer in it?

A friend warned me and he was correct that potted bambusa quickly eat up the soil and need to be repotted frequently. I obtained some in Feb in 20l pots and repotted twice by Aug or Sep, currently in 80l pots and they look fine. I watered daily - big soakings.
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Glen
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Re: Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by Glen »

1. Follow Brad's advice, and make sure you have adequate soil volume. If the plants are rootbound, you will not be able to keep them watered sufficiently in warm weather. Like Brad, I water my potted bamboos every day, when it is warm.

2. When you water, soak the soil heavily. Repeated shallow watering can cause the rootball to desiccate slowly, as the plant removes the water from the core of the rootball. The surface may seem moist, but it may be dry below. I have had this happen too many times to count.

2. I may be wrong, but it looks like you have your pots in drainage trays. I do not use them, as it is generally not a good idea to let plants sit in stagnant water. Tropical bamboos seem particularly resistant to overwatering, so I do not think this is your problem here. I am just trying to point out any potential issues that I see.

3. I am not familiar with the fertilizer you named. For potted plants, particularly if they are stressed, I highly recommend a quality water soluble fertilizer, with trace elements: http://www.miraclegro.com/smg/goprod/mi ... cale=en_US

4. If available, give the plants some shade. I always try to keep my potted bamboos shaded. I am not familiar with your weather, but containers of soil can get extremely hot in the sun, and this is not good for most plants. Bamboos are forest plants, and they do not want their root systems to bake.
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Re: Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by Ophiuchus »

Glen wrote:1. Follow Brad's advice, and make sure you have adequate soil volume. If the plants are rootbound, you will not be able to keep them watered sufficiently in warm weather. Like Brad, I water my potted bamboos every day, when it is warm.

2. When you water, soak the soil heavily. Repeated shallow watering can cause the rootball to desiccate slowly, as the plant removes the water from the core of the rootball. The surface may seem moist, but it may be dry below. I have had this happen too many times to count.

2. I may be wrong, but it looks like you have your pots in drainage trays. I do not use them, as it is generally not a good idea to let plants sit in stagnant water. Tropical bamboos seem particularly resistant to overwatering, so I do not think this is your problem here. I am just trying to point out any potential issues that I see.

3. I am not familiar with the fertilizer you named. For potted plants, particularly if they are stressed, I highly recommend a quality water soluble fertilizer, with trace elements: http://www.miraclegro.com/smg/goprod/mi ... cale=en_US

4. If available, give the plants some shade. I always try to keep my potted bamboos shaded. I am not familiar with your weather, but containers of soil can get extremely hot in the sun, and this is not good for most plants. Bamboos are forest plants, and they do not want their root systems to bake.
Excellent advice. My pots get full sun, will soaking plants twice a day suffice for the lack of shade?
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Re: Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by needmore »

Ophiuchus wrote:Excellent advice. My pots get full sun, will soaking plants twice a day suffice for the lack of shade?
My pots are in heavy sun most of the day here in summer and seemed fine with a morning drowning, we had many days above 95F and some above 100F and I did not see signs of heat stress with the one soaking. Our night temps though do drop 30-40 degrees in summer so they had that cool down.
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Re: Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by Glen »

needmore wrote:
Ophiuchus wrote:Excellent advice. My pots get full sun, will soaking plants twice a day suffice for the lack of shade?
My pots are in heavy sun most of the day here in summer and seemed fine with a morning drowning, we had many days above 95F and some above 100F and I did not see signs of heat stress with the one soaking. Our night temps though do drop 30-40 degrees in summer so they had that cool down.
I usually water just before sundown. I do not spray the foliage, since I do not want to encourage disease. When it is really hot, I also try to water at midday. I only water when the plant needs water at the root zone. I do not try to compensate for high temperatures or lack of shade by watering. To state this another way, I only water if the plant is getting dry, NOT just because the temperature is high. If a plant is stressed by heat, it does not need to stay too wet. High soil temperatures and overly saturated soils are a recipe for disaster.

I agree that night temperatures probably play a role. In the summer, our temperatures drop to around 80 degrees Fahrenheit, so the pots start the day pretty warm.

I think it is not just about temperature, but also about sun angle. I live at around 30 degrees north latitude. During the summer, the high midday sun is very oppressive for many plants, so shade is important. When the sun is lower in the sky during the rest of the year, we can still get hot, but the low sun angle does not seem to cause the same amount of stress to plants.
Ophiuchus
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Re: Advice on my Gracilis, too much or not enough water?

Post by Ophiuchus »

Glen wrote:
needmore wrote:
Ophiuchus wrote:Excellent advice. My pots get full sun, will soaking plants twice a day suffice for the lack of shade?
My pots are in heavy sun most of the day here in summer and seemed fine with a morning drowning, we had many days above 95F and some above 100F and I did not see signs of heat stress with the one soaking. Our night temps though do drop 30-40 degrees in summer so they had that cool down.
I usually water just before sundown. I do not spray the foliage, since I do not want to encourage disease. When it is really hot, I also try to water at midday. I only water when the plant needs water at the root zone. I do not try to compensate for high temperatures or lack of shade by watering. To state this another way, I only water if the plant is getting dry, NOT just because the temperature is high. If a plant is stressed by heat, it does not need to stay too wet. High soil temperatures and overly saturated soils are a recipe for disaster.

I agree that night temperatures probably play a role. In the summer, our temperatures drop to around 80 degrees Fahrenheit, so the pots start the day pretty warm.

I think it is not just about temperature, but also about sun angle. I live at around 30 degrees north latitude. During the summer, the high midday sun is very oppressive for many plants, so shade is important. When the sun is lower in the sky during the rest of the year, we can still get hot, but the low sun angle does not seem to cause the same amount of stress to plants.
Thanks for the input. :)
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