Yeah, I know, no such thing as a dumb question. LOL I have one though. If you let your brugs go dormant then bring them back out in the spring...some of the branches and even part of the trunk at times, seems to get withered. Some are worse than others. Some just look a week bit raisin like on the branches and on some it goes partially down the trunks.
Is a big nice drink going to perk these back up or should they just be cut off? In the past, some have not recovered while others have. You can usually tell if a part is a complete gonner, but when they are just slightly wrinkled, I can never decide. What do you experts think?
Waking up the brugs. I have a dumb question.
Pretty dumb question Chele! LOL
I have no idea as mine never sleep. But I have had wrinkled ones puff up before. If it is not wet rot, I would wait till you get growth and see what happens then. You can always cut it. Then again, it the problem is above the Y, why not trim it back and get some good spring growth. Below the Y will postpone your flowers.
I have creeping winter rot on a few, and I must cut it off for it creeps down the limb. But I seal off the limb when I do cut to good wood. My problem is it so wet here, I hate to cut anything yet till it dries out.
I bet you get better advice! LOL
hmmm i know the ladies here that grown them if left outside they cut theirs all the way down to about a foot. if not ground level.
once they start to shivel they cut them down. the stalks turn brownish color and dry out.
i had ones that i tried last year that were still green but wrinlky and shriveled and they didnt make it. they got these black spots on them and they never recovered.
i think if you wait and see they may come back from the bottoms and you will have to cut the other part out.
wait and see what happens.
i am no expert as i still havent gotten a huge one yet.
hmmm - not an expert here at all - but I had some of mine do that and I cut off just the wilted part, and the healthy, harder parts started growing little leaves. One of my Isabella X's lost it's other side of the "Y" because of it, but it sure didn't look to me like it would benefit the tree by keeping it there.
Thanks ladies! I would say the cause of the shriveling on mine, is being dry. They have been in the garage since November with NO water. I considered just cutting them off at the soil and starting over as some of the cooler-warm zone people have to do. Some are very nice standard ones and a few have multiple stems but most them bloomed last year. I am wanting to move them all to my greenhouse in the next few days so they can take off. I did that last year and had blooms by mid summer. I will just cut off what looks like a total loss and see what comes of them after that. Some have a wrinkled looking section with new shoots above it. I am guess in that case, the new growth has sucked the nutrients/moisture from the other part causing it to shrivel? Hey, it sounds good in theory. LOL
Kell, what exactly is creeping winter rot? What do you seal the cut parts with?
Imzadi, I seriously am considering just wacking some to the dirt. I am hoping to only have to do that to the bush type ones and not my nice alley trees.
Karrie, I had the same thing happen. I have a huge one that is one of Kyle's crosses. I had to cut it back to get it into the garage last year. I followed the directions I had read, leaving so many buds above the second Y's. I had a nice big Y tree that had two more Y's. One of each branches above the little Y's croaked. It still looked fine though. I rooted all the cut off pieces. :)
Thanks for the advice. I'm going to go think of some more dumb questions now Kell. Ha ahhaha ha ha
I had one brug over the winter, that went semi dormant. It still had some leaves, that stayed green, but the growth was very, very slow. It's perking up now.
It was quite branched out, and I've noticed over the winter that about `1/4 of these branches have dried up and got that raisin look with the bark seeming like paper. I finally got fed up with it, and cut off the withered raisin like branches, and found that they were dead. There wasn't any green wood in those branches at all. I doubt if they would've come back.
Badseed if they have been that long with no water they might be dried up. They are pretty tuff plants though.
Start at the ends of the branches and trim off a little bit at a time untill you see some green on the inside. If they are dried and hollow there's no chance they will come back.If there is no
signs of healthy growth cut them off at soil level,water and then don't water again till the soil feels dry. This will prevent root rot. Hopefully they will produce new shoots from the roots.
Good luck.
Thanks again, very much! On most of them, the trunks still look good and only the higher branches are shriveled. On most it is above the Y. Some of them actually wilted up at the top of the main trunk. Several that I have are bush shaped with multiple trunks. I think I will cut out the shriveled up branches and see how it goes. If all else fails I can cut them to the ground and start over. :(
I agree, I'd cut out the shriveled part. They should regrow pretty fast now that it's warming up.
Thanks!
My greenhouse is usually above 45 in the evening and most days is above 75-80. Do you think the lows in the 40s will hurt them at all?
I have another question. LOL I want to move all my ears and brugs out there. I have tons of seeds up and coming up. Should I use some sort of soil drench on all the plants I want to drag out there? I'll cry if some bug infestion comes up out of the potted plants and wipes out my seed crop. I did see a couple of aphids on the leaf of an ear that sprouted in the garage. I figure I can cut off the leaves but what about the critters I don't see?
I don't like soil drenches unless there's a serious problem, I'd just keep an eye open for problems. I would kill those aphids, they multiply like mad in the spring.
45 should be fine for the brugs, but some ears don't like to be that cold for extended periods.
Thanks again Susie! I figure I will cut the ears completely back. Some look better than others. I kept them dry for the winter. It looks like my huge melanga rotted. :( I just found out where a huge Asian market is though. HA ha!
'chele, I am just now waking my dormant brugs up for the year. Well, they are waking themselves up a bit earlier than I wanted them to, but that's another story. LOL
I bring them out and give them a good drink and let them just sit for a bit. I don't cut anything off until I know for sure it's dead. Sometimes I'm surprised when a dead looking branch starts to leaf out. Once the plant is leafed out good, and new growth usually starts from the bottom again, I will cut off any branches that appear to still be dead looking. I don't get in a hurry to start pruning them.
I don't usually let the GH go below 50, but I've moved them out into 40's 'real' weather lately, (three weeks or more) and none have suffered. (including Rothkirch, culebra,ep, Desiree, tiara).
The drying branches you mention seem to benefit by misting; a batch of mine (bucket Brugs) did that drying out thing, and when I started misting them they put out leaves, even though they didn't look much better otherwise. But since their butts were in water, it seemed safe to think they were getting enough water from the bottom side. Rot in pots is a whole different ugly unsolved mystery!
But Joan, why drag an 8 foot plant out of the garage, put it in a wagon, pull it up the sidewalk, up the grass bath, around the house, through the gate and MUD, across the back yard, up three steps, down a step and put it in my green house, when I could whack it down and only drag a 2 foot plant that far? ROTFLOL Sorry, obnoxious is in my nature. LOL I will water them and see what happens. I know there a few branches that I am sure are 'done for' but I'll leave the iffy ones and see.
Thanks for your reply lagata. I was catious in posting the most extreme lowes of late. For the last two early mornings, the greenhouse temp has been around 65 which means the eves probably weren't much cooler. Our highs and lows have only been about 10-15 degrees different lately. And I have not seen the sun in a couple of days! I keep a space heater running out there. The downfall of the heater is it is a cheapie so I can set it at *frost* which makes it kick on at 44, keeping it from going below 41 or I can set it to go anywhere from 65-95. The greenhouse is not air tight and I didn't get around to stuffing a few gaps. I figure this time of the year I may just leave those go because in another month, I'll be killing myself to cool it down in there. LOL
The garage is a bit cooler than the basement so I didn't water the plants out there for fear of rot. The year before I kept all my plants in the basement but that just meant my daughters cat had a whole plethra of cat boxes! I spent my winter dumping dirt, refilling dirt, etc. I'm hoping to find a way to add a second layer of protection to my greenhouse and leave my plants out there this coming winter.
I am back with an additional stupid question. LOL What exactly constitutes 'green'? On a couple of the wrinkly brug stems, there is green between the actual wood and bark and the pith is still soft but the woody layer is actually rather white and woody. Are those done for? One of those was Dr. Seuss and I think another was CG. I really like those obnoxious bright colors too.
Amazingly, 99% of the brugs in the garage are still alive! I even have some itty bitty skinny seedlings that held on. They were stacked on top of the larger pots and sent roots down into that dirt. A weird observation-the dirt in the brug pots was nearly completely dry while the dirt in the ear pots was still dark and moist. Would the assumption be that the brug roots sucked up the moisture while the ears fed off the bulb? Weird mind, I know. :)
Hmmm, are we bored with me already??
My brugs are already greening up and leafing out!
Just for fun...Of the two dozen or so brugs that I have, would anyone like to guess
1) Which brug kept going strong, putting out leaves and never missed a step?
2) Which brug had many seed pods despite my not trying to pollenate at all?
Pretty hard to guess not knowing what you have for brugs now. At my house, it would be "Harlot". Maybe Butterfly?
Too bad for me that I do not have either of those. LOL Someone else reported that the pod making one was a hussie last year. :)
The most hardy, strong guerilla is one of the first most originals I believe.
I've been watching this thread and thought I'd post this picture and a thought that crossed my mind.
Renee gave me a cutting the last time I was up there. Short, no leaves and I'm not sure if it was already rooted when I received it. The tip started to shrivel and was continuing down toward the base. Since there was no mold or other sign of disease, I opted to leave it alone.
As seen in this pic, the stem dried out down to the first nodal joint (may be incorrect term..) and there are now sprouts from that joint.
Seems like I've heard brugs are related to roses. This is typical Rose behavior when not pruned correctly above a joint. I believe I've read the plant seals off at the joint the stem above then dries up to that point since water and food was cut off.
This message was edited Mar 27, 2005 7:36 AM
Thank you for your input!
I decided to opt on the side of caution and not have to prune them once they start growing. I snipped in the middle of the wrinkly spots and found them pretty much hollow. After dipping my pruners in bleach, I cut lower until I found a nice solid part and did cut right above leaf nodes. The only one I messed up on was one of my Isabelle. I cut her off about 8 inches lower than I needed to. She wasn't a nice tree specimen anyway so it really won't change much.
Looking at the picture again, I'm thinking I should post that in the rose forum.
A constant question with roses is how to prune. General rule is 1/4" above a joint at a 45 degree angle sloping away from the node above which you are cutting.
Look at this pic. Looks like the dieback stopped at a 45 degree angle and slopes away from the new sprout.
That was an accidental observation!
Happy Easter
blaine/BaBs
I see no one wants to play. Woe is me. hahahaha
Everlasting put out the most seed pods even though I did nothing.
Frosty is the roughest, toughest brug I stored apparently.
HAPPY EASTER!!