Garden Pests and Diseases: Small gardenia in container as gift - what's wrong with it?, 2 by ufpspock

ufpspock wrote:
I got a small potted gardenia (8" pot, maybe?) sent to me as a gift from a friend. It seems to have something wrong with it. I thought maybe it was due to some sort of stress encountered during shipping, but I've had it a month and it still is unhappy.

I first noticed that the buds were dropping, but then I looked closer and I saw that there are leaves turning brown and dropping off, too. Some buds look OK right now, but nothing has looked like buds were trying to open at all (and there were some good-sized buds on it when I got it last month).

I haven't watered it in the whole month and the potting medium still feels damp to me.

Does this plant need a bigger pot?
Is it too wet (and if so, what can I do other than just wait for it to dry out...)?
Is there a disease at work here?

I don't have a picture of the whole plant right now, since it's at the office and I just brought home a couple buds to post pictures. If you think a whole plant picture would help, I can get one of those too.

Thanks so much for any ideas!