INkberrys having problems

[Hamons]

Just found this board and I am very excited. Seems to be like a good bag of seed. 100% seed 0% Weeds and 0% other crop. ;)

I have had probelms with two seperate inkberry holly plants this year at two seperate locations. I was wonderign if you could help me troubleshoot them.

They look good and then very rapidly drop leaves. Both plants were planted in well amended soil. One set has been watered religiously according to a good plan (30 min 1x week) and the others have almost never been watered (these are ones I planted in my yard). Both are in part sun. The pictures below are from a customers home.

Any ideas?

[Hamons]

#2

[Hamons]

#3

[AZTLANLC]

Have you checked the mulch around'em?

[scott C]

scale ??? seen similar symptoms on Burning bush Next to impossible to tell from those pics

[Stonehenge]

How long after planting did they drop their leaves? Were both sets planted this year? Are they all acting in the same manner?

What kind of weather have you had this year?

[P-Train]

My first thought was they were not getting enough water.

You're watering them for thirty minutes once a week?

Probably not enough water. Could be transplant shock, too. Or both.

[agla]

The way that the defoliation is in areas of the plant and on random plants in different locations makes me wonder if it is fert burn to the roots.

Did you have your guys add granular fert to the holes or on the surface?

[Hamons]

They were palnted in early June. I always give my customers a watering schedule that has them waterign everyday and then tapering it off until they are once a week.

Only fertilizer used was a handful of milorganite tossed intot the whole at planting time.

They dropped their leaves after about 6 weeks.

Mulch was a little high and I sooped that away form the root s-- but I doubt if that was the problem.



Not scale -- very familiar with that.

Yes -- both were planted aat the same time.

[Paul]

The first thing to check is water, most likely the plant is too wet. From the pictures posted they seem to be in moderate shade. My next question would be, where these plants container grown? How where they cared for at the nursery? Most container grown plants are watered daily but being grown above ground they drain off very fast this really keeps the root system dry so the plants absorb water quickly. So they are used to this cycle. Now they are in a different environment, less light, water avable 24/7 and more nutrients

[Nek]

Same thing happened to 17 Inkberries I planted at my home this spring. Dropped ALOT of leaves.....some branch dieback. All coming around nicely. Im attributing it to transplant shock.

[PSUscaper]

Another thing to mention......

One of the biggest problems with inkberry holly is the mis-conception of growth habbit.

In case you don't know this........Ink berry holly bottoms out, opens up, and does not retain a 'boxwood' like habbit.

I've been noticing a lot of very good looking ink berry holly at nurseries lately......the only problem is that it is a false image of what the plant will look like.....

Growers are prunning young ink berry into nice, boxwood habbit plants......the only problem is they do not retain that, and cannot be forced into that.

Many landscapers use ink berry because they look like boxwood when you plant them and cost 1/3 the price of a comparable boxwood. Then, in a few years, people wonder why they have these tall, stalky evergreens that are 3 ft tall and only have leaves on the top.........because that is what they do.

Ink berry is NOT a good foundation planting choice. They are great in large clusters where they can be clumped together tight and look even better when you plant a smaller shrub in front to hide the inevitable bottoming out.

Also, I believe that a lot of leave drop is due to the improper pruning at the grower/nursery level. They are not meant to be boxwoods, so don't expect them to be.

In general, I would say most of the leave drop is transplant shock. As for the 'open' appearance.......i think that is what the plant is suppose to look like, and it is just growing into the plant it wants to be, not the plant the grower pruned it into.

[Hamons]

I agree with inkberrys. They are one of my favorite shrubs -- especially when fronted with some low azaleas. I really like their texture and movement when compared to boxwoods.

These partinks are the nordic variety -- tend to be more dense and compact.

My final assesment is the soil whenre they were put was too dense and clay filled and they needed more drainage. I will replace them and amend soil further. I will proably put these aprticiular plants in my ICU at home and see what i can do for them.

[GLAN]

keep in mind you are still going to have the problem that underneath thins out