something wrong happened to my jasmine in less than a week!

I don't know what, but almost all the leaves are gonners, they started by developing a weird reddish/copper-y tint, then discolored towards yellow, and at any slight wind gust or if touched they would fall.
The jasmine I'm talking about is a Chilean Jasmine (mandevilla laxa). I've had it for less than a year, was relatively happy in a sunny location, meaning that the leaves until last week were green and nice, but it never flowered for me though.
I don't see any little buggers on the leaves or under the leaves.
Right now, it has about 3 little branches that still appear to have normal leaves.
What is this? what should I do?
I was thinking of the following possibilities:
- prune it
- check roots/repot
- take those 3 remaining little branches (softwood) as cuttings and trying to root them

Please help!
Goofy

here is a closeup of how the leaves look.
I should say that it's watered every other day, if it doesn't rain.

Since you've got it in a pot, it wouldn't hurt to pull it out and take a look at the roots and see how wet (or dry) the soil is. I'm guessing with watering every other day that it's not underwatering, but it could be overwatering, or it could be that the plant has gotten really rootbound which has a similar effect as underwatering.

It'll be plenty hardy in your zone, this one is hardier than typical mandevillas and even the other ones would be hardy in your zone, so you might also consider planting it in the ground instead of in a pot. Plants are generally happier and easier to care for that way and less subject to fluctuating moisture levels, etc.

Thanks, Ecrane!
I will definitely check it. To me, it's so surprising for the quick deterioration. When I've got it, it was so small as compared to the pot.
I would love to put it in the ground, but it's landlord's garden, and I'll be moving soon (end of May) to El Paso. I will post another thread soon, about suggestions for the move, since I don't want to leave any plant behind.

Alexandra

Hi, Ecrane!
I took it out of the pot (my DH had to join forces with me, the stupid pretty pot had a rim towards inside). At the bottom, the roots were woven like a piece of felt! Bad enough so far? no! It really lost all the leaves now.
I moved it into a huge pot now (how could she grow that big roots in less than 1 year? I bought it in a 4-inch pot!), but I don't really know if she'll come back to me!

What do you think? Any hope?
goofy

How huge was the pot? It's usually best to pot up gradually, so if you went from something like a 1 gal pot to a 20 gal pot that's probably not the best thing (having a plant in a pot that's too big increases your chances of overwatering). Also I hope when you moved it you tried to tease apart the roots at the bottom--otherwise if the roots are still all tangled up in each other they will have a hard time expanding out into the new soil.

Well, it was huge to me! I moved it from a 10 to a 14 inch pot. i tried to untangle as much as I could the roots, but I surely ended up breaking some of them, that were too fine and so tightly woven. I also moved it to a shady location for now, maybe until some leaves pop out (if ever?!).
To complicate things, for two days now we've got heavy rains...

Oh, 10 inch to 14 inch should be fine. When you said a huge pot, I had visions of you moving it from a little pot into some giant tub! And that was really smart to move it to a shady area, anytime you damage the roots a bit during transplanting that always helps the plant get back on its feet again if it doesn't have to deal with the hot sun. You may want to try and protect it from some of the rain if you can so that it doesn't get too wet.

I was watching and posting some photos on another thread, and i found one of two weeks ago, with the jasmine (part of it appears in the pic) alive and kicking, close to the hibiscus. Here's for you to see as well. The most leaves were on top, climbing on that arch, though, so this was the thinnest area.
I will move it further towards the house, so the roof will keep it away from the rain.
Thanks, Ecrane, for all the good advice!
Alexandra

As for both the plants you have been worried about, if you have good drainage in the bottom of the pots, then the heavy rain wont do too much damage, rain water is better for plants anyway, just we sometimes get either too much or too little at times, in a week or so, I would give the plants a liquid feed at one of your watering sessions to give them a bit of a boost now that they are settled into there new pots or positions, and you have new leaf growth, sometimes when I have taken a plant out of a pot and found a heavy mass of root ball, I have actually sliced off some roots to make it regenerate nice fresh roots, but naturally you cant do this with all plants as some dont like root disturbance at all, you are doing well and treating the plants for there best chances to regrow, so good luck. WeeNel.

WeeNel,
Thank you for the encouragement!
For most of my plants, I do not leave the saucer under the pot, just because here when it rains, it pours! So, theoretically, it should drain quite well. But the Mandevilla grew quite a lot in this one year, and the roots even more. So, that's how it formed that compact, felt-like mass in the bottom. It took some tears to break that apart. But I still wonder if, given these roots, it drained properly. I didn't find bugs, worms or grubs in the rootball. Nothing on the leaves either. So, it must be either a water problem, or rootbound-ing. I hope it will recover.
I still have no sings of new growth, and no leaves at all...

What happens when something is really rootbound is that you have lots and lots of roots in the pot but relatively little soil. So the roots want more water than the soil that's there can hold, and it becomes almost impossible to get the plant the right amount of water. You've got a good chance that it'll recover now that it's in a new pot, but I wouldn't expect new growth yet, you'll need to give it more than a couple days in the new pot before you can expect that! The important thing now is make sure not to water it too much--before when it was rootbound it needed a lot more water than it will need now that it's in a bigger pot with more soil, so if you water it at the same frequency as you did before you're more likely to overwater it. And since it doesn't have any leaves right now, it's also not losing water through transpiration the way it would have when it had leaves, so that will also decrease the amount of water it needs.

I have a massive Mandevilla (dipladenia) but it grows in a bright conservatory, cool in winter, I am sure there are different types, but for mine, from October to March, I only just water enough to keep the plant alive, then from March/April, the start of the growing season, I re-pot it at this time too into a good rich compost as they are hungry feeders, I gradually increase the amount of water and add a liquid feed every two weeks from May onwards, there after it requires a good amount of water but it must be allowed to drain easily so I tip the water out from the saucer after about an hour, you probably wont see new green leaf growth for about a month as this is just the beginning of the growing season, so try relax and give the plant a chance to recover from re potting and time to settle, the time to start thinking disaster is if you find the stems starting to rot or go brown and dry like they have started to die off, but even then, sometimes plants stems can turn brown at the tips, you would just nip this off down to a healthy part of the stem, but to be honest, you are a good bit away from this happening, I think your plant is probably a different type from mine, but I am sure they treatment will be so similar, just water it when required for now a wait for another few weeks before staring to panic. Good luck. WeeNel.

Thanks again, Ecrane and WeeNel! I will give it time, I'm not prepared to give it up so quickly anyway!
I dream of a fragrant garden...

To start your fragrant garden, as you are in Florida, try a couple of Angels Trumpets, these have a good strong perfume, especially in the evening, another thing to try is Orange or grapefruit/lemons bushes, these have a wonderful perfume and will increase in size year after year, the flowers are wonderful too also try some of the oriental lilies bulbs, these have lovely perfumes, but they only flower once a season, but I love them, they are worth the wait,
good luck. WeeNel.

WeeNel, Iin the last year I bought this jasmine and one I started from seed, then a Gardenia, and the roses (all of them scented), and I'm really killing myself for wanting to have a LILAC and LAVENDER here in Fl (stupid, goofy me). Except for the roses (and these, with great effort), none of the above are happy or flowering. I saw recently a brugmansia "live" (not in pictures), and I really liked it and I might start one in El Paso.

the lavenders are easy to grow so long as you dont over water them, try the french lavenders as they are more used to warmer climates than the English lavenders, if you cant grow them in the garden, then try doing it in pots, that way you can shift them around to find the place they are happy, maybe need a bit more shade than normal, good luck. WeeNel.

OK, update on the jasmine: it is officially dead. It did not recover. I am so sorry, especially sine I did not know that rootbounding can kill a plant. Or, maybe it was something else that "helped", that I cannot pinpoint.
Anyway, now I moved and my gardenia (who played the tough lady for half a year) decided that she didn't mind 3 days in the truck and started flowering. Lovely scent, beautiful flowers, and my DH and I play bets on which bloom will open next! Another for the scented garden that does well so far is the Madagascar jasmine (Stephanotis floribunda) that I sprouted from seed.
I will consider the trumpets, they are beautiful flowers, but the ones I saw in Miami were huge, hard to keep them potted, I think.
Since now I am in a new location, I will probably try a Mandevilla again, as soon as i "escape" from all the unpacking ordeals.

Thanks for all the advice and for being here for me!

you should just cut it back to six inches it is probably not dead