I love gardening--it is good for my emotional health. Living in southwestern NY state means I only have a few months out of the year to spend on my hobby, though. I have pretty good luck w/ simple gardening and have some beautiful flowers in my yard. However, I tried last year and this year unsuccessfully to grow a Hibiscus. The nursery where I purchased the first one replaced it for free because they guarantee their plants for 1 year. But alas, I managed to kill this one too! It started out beautifully w/ bright green leaves and several buds. Maybe it was the beetles that were chewing on the leaves--could they have destroyed the whole plant? Should I try again?
Bella,I don't know a lot about gardening, but since I'm home so much,I have started to grow many different kinds of flowers. I do know the beetles will destroy the hibiscus! Did mine the first year. Now I use sevin on everything as soon as I see the first beetles. Good luck!
i think its the climate. i have all hibiscus pots around my pool and at first they did have some aphids that ate the blooms and leaves. get some bugbegone or specific aphid killer from home depot or lowes. and a good shot of miracle grow will help the blooms. the leaves tend to yellow abit after fertilizing but will correct itself. I have red/peach/yellow/tangerine flowering/pots with handsize blooms and they are so lovely! they require constant water!! everyday alot of water to the roots. or they die off quickly and half shade/sun is good too or they tend to wilt faster. good luck, they are spectacular plants once they start blooming! divvi
Another user of Sevin, I don't have Hibiscus, however, I use it on my rose bushes & any other plant that they seem to devour. I hate those nasty bugs. I love landscaping & have dug holes & planted many shrubs, since we moved here 2 years ago. Takes a lot of times to maintain them, however, it is a good stress reliever.
bella- you might want to try Hibiscus syriacus or Rose of Sharon bush. It is a very hardy bush and has pretty flowers - we grow it here in the NW where it can get cold. It is hard to kill.
bella - My hope was to get heavily into gardening here and still hope to do so. Right now it's just too darned hot. Our ground is rocky and we're on a very steep slope which runs down to a ravine with a creek running through it. I was looking for my "garden of eden" and thought I'd found it here until reno hell took over. And then two storms including a brutal ice storm in which we lost a lot of trees and limbs. But...gardening has saved me in the past and I have hopes for it again.
For bella and anyone who loves gardening check out gardenweb.com - lots of different categories including some by the area in which you live. I can spend hours on there. I spent a few hours the other night on a gorgeous garden blog by a landscape designer/sculptor in the bay area. You can find it by googling GARDEN PORN. Great name, huh? If you love great narrative and eye candy check it out. Garden blogs are another wonderful way to waste time on the computer. Hey, it's not wasting time if we're enjoying it!
Check out robsplants.com anytime you need a description of care for a particular plant, Here is the link for hibiscus: http://www.robsplants.com/plantsGK.php
He lists about 6 kinds of hibiscus with pictures and discussion and anybody can write in with a question or suggestion about a particular plant.
This is a great site (says the proud mother of Rob).
WOW Jeannette - wonderful site. I'd be proud too! What a lot of work went into it. I too am looking forward to exploring it some more. Right now I'm drooling over his own garden.
I should add that as long as he was at home Rob would only do gardening tasks as a paid job or because he felt obligated to help. No real interest. It was DH who was the passionate gardener. But when he got his own place in PA he has become an expert. In 2007 and 2008 I was there to help him with his plant sale in May. People come from all over to buy his plants. Not this year, since he was coming here the next week.
Hi, all. Yes, I am a gardener and absolutely love it. primarily, I have roses--22 bushes now. I had 27 but with winter, etc., lost 5. I may not replace them. I have hydrangeas, rhododendrons, apple tree, blueberries, you name it--I may have a sampling. I also planted a small vegetable garden again this year. I just keep fertilizing my roses and everything else and I spray the roses with a fungicide every 2-3 weeks to keep them looking good. They are particularly beautiful this year--but enough bragging. I have not tried anything that isn't tried and true for the Pacific NW. Never tried hibiscus. Maybe I'll do that next year. They are beautiful.
Mawzy, your garden sounds gorgeous. I love roses, but never seemed to have much luck with them up north, and down here the deer don't mind munching on them. I usually have a hibiscus on the bedroom deck. I do love their big colorful flowers.
Try asking at the nurseries in your area. Google and yellow pages (whatever those are!) are a good place too. Most newspapers have a gardening section on Saturday, that may have the info also.
TexasJoe, Check out whether there is a Master Gardener chapter there. They offer classes (I think you can do them on-line) and a lot of interaction with other gardeners. DH took the classes about 6 years ago. He's still involved, but not particularly active. He goes to some of their short programs. Yesterday he went on a tour of MG gardens. He's given up most of the other groups he belonged to and backed off some MG activities, but he sticks with them as much as he can. He says he learns a lot from them.
Home Depot has a garden club. They used to e-mail some great coupons but haven't done that for a while. All our local garden centers have cut way back on their stock.
JeanetteB--thanks for referring me to "robsplants". I went to the site--beautiful pictures--I wrote in my question and got some good information, in a very timely manner too. There may be hope for my hibiscus--next year, hopefully!
OK, Bella, glad it worked for you. Keep us posted on your hibiscus! I've been trying for years to make our garden less maintenance-intensive. My project this year was to get one ditch bank cleared of weeds and planted to ivy or myrtle. I've started on it several times . . . . DH is no help at all anymore. Right now all we get done is blackberries picked. (Oh, I shouldn't complain too loudly, he DOES help with that -- and with eating them too!