over watering help needed

I have the habit of over watering, coming from Eugene OR, I think everything needs more here in Bakersfield CA... hot hot hot. So what to do with the potted trees that are over watered and suffering? Plants are Black Knight butterfly bush and a duranta sapphire showers. (standard forms) Should I repot or just keep holding back the water? One other thing this is the second year in a row that the blossoms on my gardenia seem to burn up before they can bloom. More watering problems? Can some one help?

On the overwatered trees--I'd stick your finger in the pot and see how wet it feels, if it's really sopping wet or if you've been watering them too much for quite a while then I'd definitely repot, there's probably fungus starting to grow in there. But if this was a one time thing where you watered too much once or twice but it hasn't been that way for very long and it's not dripping wet now, then you can let it dry out naturally and probably be fine.

As far as the gardenia--it could be watering but it might not be, your climate is far from ideal for gardenias unfortunately. I'd put them on the coolest side of your house and make sure they don't get any afternoon sun and they're more likely to be happy. Anytime I've had mine on the warmer side of the house (even if it was shaded) or somewhere that they got PM sun they've always fried, and my summers aren't even as bad as yours.

Thank you for the advise. The plants have only been in the pots for about 4 weeks, maybe 5. 1 of them, i am sure it is too big for the size of the root ball. Should I repot or I was even thinking of putting in a peat pot than back into the same very large terracotta pot? I have many other questions about the different problems I am having with the plants I have, I just cant get out of an OR. frame of mind when it comes to gardening. Would you mind an email or 30? (lol)

How much too big is it? If the plant for example came out of a 1 gallon size nursery pot and you put it in a 20 gallon pot, then it definitely needs to move to something smaller. But on the other hand, if it was in a 1 gal pot and you put it in something more of a 5 gallon size, that would probably be fine. The rule of thumb is to only pot up one size at a time. If it is way too big that'll definitely make it much easier for you to overwater the plant since there's such a huge volume of soil to hold water and such a tiny amount of roots to take it up.

And if you have lots of other questions, feel free to post them all here in this forum, that's exactly what it's here for! If they are on very different subjects, you may want to start new threads for them so that each problem can get its own separate discussion, otherwise they might end up all jumbled up together and nothing will make sense!