Hello everyone,

I hope someone can help my with this because I am stumped. My Chinese Fringe Flower (Plum Delight) hasyYellow leaves and I can't seem to figure out what is wrong. It gets good sunlight, plenty of water, and I have recently tried adding iron to the soil thinking it might either need iron or that the soil needed to be more acidic, but while I might have seen a BIT of color come back (there are purple leaves here and there), it is still mainly yellow.

Any help is much appreciated.

Thank you,
Dave Green

Hi Dave,
Yellowing leaves is called chlorosis and can be caused by different things. The way the leaves yellow is important for diagnosis. Take a look at this site.

http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/focus/chlorosis.html

You might also find this interesting.

http://www.paghat.com/fringeflower.html

You may need to take a soil test.
Good luck,
Newt

I am curious about the website Newt recommends for chlorisis problems. Would Howard go along with drilling holes in the trunks of the plants??!!!! Seems to go against everything I have ever heard him say.

Some of the prettiest speciments you can find of this are in front of W. T. White high school in north Dallas. The crazy part? They get almost no care. Just some compost once a year. A friend planted them about 3 years ago and they pretty much just grow on their own. Rain is their main source of water by far and they are beneath large oak trees so they are in partial sun conditions.

Mites are known to cause the yellowing. I suspect maybe you are watering them too much. Chlorosis often comes with the roots being overwhelmed by moisture - drowning, so to speak. Lay off and let them breathe a bit. Also too much Texas sun can be a culprit. The ones I see that are most happy get partial sun here. They also prefer a more acid pH but as we all know, well maintained soil with plenty of compost will alleviate that problem. I have seen advice to use them like an azalea, which is far too fussy a plant for me.

Hope this helps!
Kathe