Hello All.
My Impanties niamniamensis 'Congo Cockatoo' was doing beautifully for months but has recently started to noticeably decline. The flowers are now small and pale and don't develop fully and the plant overall is wilty. I have it in a grow room which gets very warm in the summer and I try to keep it evenly moist. Should I find a cooler spot for it? Should I water more/less? Should I add sulphur to the soil (to increase the soil's acidity)?
Any advice would be sincerely appreciated.
Erick
Impatiens niamnimaensis 'Congo Cockatoo' Advice Please
I've never adjusted the pH on mine and they seem to do fine, although if your water is different than mine you could have a different experience. How warm is very warm? I have several that I keep outside in the shade during the summer here and they do fine, so unless your room gets really, really warm that's probably not it (and it's a tropical plant, so unless the warmth is accompanied by too much sun I wouldn't think it would be too much of a problem). Two theories...one would be too much humidity. I wouldn't normally have thought this would be a problem for a tropical type plant, but ran into someone on another forum a few days ago who was having problems with theirs and they thought it was partly too much humidity, and I can tell you that mine do great here where we don't have humidity. The other possibility is over or under watering. Normally I would suspect overwatering because that's more common, but if your room is really warm then it could be underwatering, the symptoms are often quite similar. I would stick a finger a few inches down in the soil and see how it feels, or if you don't trust yourself then get a moisture meter and see what's going on down there.
Thank you very much ecrane3. You have given me an excellent checklist of causes to check out and I will use it! My grow room gets to 80F at most during the day, so, I agree - that's unlikely to be the problem. I wouldn't think that too much humidity is the problem either, but thank you for pointing that out. I'm leaning now towards a watering issue.
The plant put out close to 40 flower buds, but the few that developed were pale and barely opened. The rest just deteriorated. I will keep working on it. I am determined to see those bright and fascinating flowers again!
Erick
My first guess would be watering, only reason I suggested the humidity factor was from this other thread where someone had problems and thought humidity could have been a factor. But if it's really from the Congo which its name would suggest then I wouldn't think humidity would be an issue! 80F shouldn't bother it, I'm sure on our super hot days it gets at least that even in the shade and mine have been fine as long as I keep them watered, I've even had them wilt pretty bad on me and they still bounced back fine once I watered them. I have had better luck getting these to bloom nicely when I grow them outdoors rather than indoors...obviously not an option for you during the wintertime, but if your weather's decent in the summer you could try that, I would gradually acclimate them by putting them outside for a little longer each day until you've worked up to them being outside all the time. Totally up to you though, they should flower nicely indoors as well given the proper conditions.
I almost killed mine too. I quit watering it and it is growing new leaves. Think it is in to big of a pot and am going to bump it back down to a small pot like a mum pot with lots of drainage hole
These like perfect drainage...add perlite to your soil mix. Overwatering has killed several of mine..... :-)
Thank you all for the great advice! I sincerely appreciate it. I have re-potted by Impatiens using a mix with lots of perlite and will now be very careful not to overwater it. It may even go outside in a semi-shady spot.
Thank you again,
Erick