Escallonia hedge dying?

ryanrod

I have an escallonia hedge around the fromt of my garden.

It has been growing there for approx 7 years.

It is the type with pink leaves.

Everything was ok until this year.

A couple of months ago a section of the hedge lost most of its leaves.
Now a large section of the hedge has lost its leaves!

I have inspected the hedge and remaining leaves have tiny white spots
maybe one or two on a leaf and parts of most leaves or black turning black.

I thought escallonia was sopposed to be resistant to disease but it looks
like disease to be.

Is there an escallonia disease out there? can I treat this some way?

I thought this prob would sort its self but it just seems to be getting worse.

Any suggestions appreciated.

bmaxi

Not much help I know, but on one of the gardening programmes on BBC they were talking of a mystery disease which was devastating escallonia in the U.K. Other than that it's hard to say why an established hedge should die off, unless someone has been spraying weedkiller in the area.

ryanrod

No weedkiller being sprayed in area.

Looks like a disease of some sort alright.

Googled UK escallonia disease and saw some mention alright.

Where's Gerry Daley when u need him?

I sopose I'll have to see how it goes.

Irish Gardener

ryanrod wrote: »

I have an escallonia hedge around the fromt of my garden.

It has been growing there for approx 7 years.

It is the type with pink leaves.

First of all, are you sure it is an Escallonia hedge.
Their leaf colours are usually various shades of green down to yellow.
You may have meant pink flowers.

ryanrod wrote: »

Everything was ok until this year.

A couple of months ago a section of the hedge lost most of its leaves.
Now a large section of the hedge has lost its leaves!

I have inspected the hedge and remaining leaves have tiny white spots
maybe one or two on a leaf and parts of most leaves or black turning black.

I thought escallonia was sopposed to be resistant to disease but it looks
like disease to be.

Is there an escallonia disease out there? can I treat this some way?

I thought this prob would sort its self but it just seems to be getting worse.

Any suggestions appreciated.

It is not unusual for the leaves of an Escallonia hedge to blacken and shed in winter, especially if you received a touch of freezing breezes.
I know it never happened before, but the hedge is now taller now (catching more wind), and something may have change in the environs eg. neighbours sheltering hedges, sheds or walls being removed.
So look for changes first.

Escallonia is generally disease and virus free, the disease "silver leaf" (not your problem) aside, it is hard to fathom what it could be.
You see with viruses, the leaves will yellow first before dropping, this can appear as dotting, streaking, or as a total leaf take over.
One or two little white dots on the base of the leaves seems very insignificant.

So the course of action I suggest is......

Half way up one of the main trunks of each Escallonia, you should lightly scrape the surface bark to inspect for life, in the form of green or white tissue with traces of sap.

If this looks good, I would then give the affected hedging plants a reduction in height and width by approx a quarter, or until you cut into sappy wood, whichever happens first.
When pruning your Escallonia plants ensure you create clean cuts without ragged edges.
Diseases is more rampant on poorly pruned specimens.
To prevent disease transfer between plants, you must wipe down your pruners with alcohol or surgical spirit before and after pruning.

Enforce strict garden hygiene around your Escallonia.
Rake out and remove any dead leaves at the base of the hedge, destroy these at a safe distance away by burning.
Also, remove any dead or badly damaged leaves on the plants and destroy these as well.
Fungal spores may exist on these dead / damaged leaves and spread the disease through wind and rain dispersal.

An Escallonia plant under stress will suffer more from the effects diseases and viruses.
De-stress your plants by keeping them well watered in dry spells and keeping them fed throughout the growing season.
Apply a pelleted chicken manure once a season; this should be adequate if you have an open, friable soil but it is not effective in heavy, sticky clay soils. In that case, you could also try applying a foliar feed such as Phostrogen or Miracle-gro (when the leaves return).

For now, when you are finished pruning give the plants in the hedge a shake of fertiliser for leafy hedges (garden centre will advise) to promote new leafing.

Now you sit back and wait for leaves.
If none have appeared by late summer, I'm sorry but you should remove the affected plants and replace with something other than Escallonia (resistant to whatever the Escallonia died from).


ryanrod, I would love to see a pic of the affected leaves anyway, both spotty and black, tomake myself morea ware of this problem.

Extracts from this post taken from Holes in laurel hedge leaves @ irishgardeners.com

Sonnenblumen

Ryanrod,

appears there could be several factors that might contribute to the unusual loss of leaf on your escallonia hedge. Before taking any drastic cutting action, have a read of Bill Blackledge's excellent column, some very useful pointers as to causes and possible remedies:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/lancashire/content/articles/2006/10/18/ask_the_gardener_hedges_feature.shtml

bmaxi

Yeah, I missed that bit about the pink leaves, I read flowers, now I'd really start to worry.:D

ryanrod

Ok

Definitely pink flowers LOL!

I took a few pics to show the condition of the hedge as suggested by Irish Gardener (thanks for fantastic reply).

You can see leaves are blackened and white spots on some.
I won't be taking any drastic action just yet, as it took so long to grow.

See what you think.

Irish Gardener

Looks like fungal leaf spot to me, in those pics the white dots you see are pycnidia (the fungal fruiting body/spreader)
Everything I have said already still stands as it is important to remove all the damaged leaves on the bush as well as those shed. All are hosts for the fungus.

The plants most affected were probably those under most stress through lack/excess of water, feed, compaction and air flow. So it is important to give the hedge some pampering as detailed in my first post.

Also visit your garden centre and purchase a fungicide suitable for use on escallonia, and apply it to halt the leaf spot. Diathane for the home gardener is one that comes to mind.

All is not lost, your plants may come good yet.

ircoha

I note IG is recommending the burning of garden waste: is this not banned by all LA's now.

ryanrod

Sprayed hedge with diathane last week will post results in coming months.

Irish Gardener

Fair play.

aberogwr

I've read all this with great interest. I'm attaching a couple of photos of my escallonia which is covered in leaves like this. They're not quite the same as Ryanrod showed, but closer than anything else I've seen. Is it the same problem? Same solution?

This escallonia is mature, about 8-10 feet tall, in a garden close to the sea.

White dargo

ryanrod wrote: »

Sprayed hedge with diathane last week will post results in coming months.

How did it go with your hedge ryanrod? I have the same problem now. Did the diathane do the trick?

Aslorn

Hi Ryanrod. I've exactly the same problem. I've about a 20 ft length of a hedge that looks like yours did. Any luck with the solution you tried?

Prowetod

I also have the same problem:P

Its almost a year since Ryanrod last posted in this thread so we might not get a result:(

ryanrod

The diathane seemed to work at first.
But now hedge (since winter) has lost nearly all it's leaves and those that
remain still have that fungal spotting.

I cut it back, a gardener I was talking to said that I had let it get too
high too quickly.
So I am waiting to see how (if) it comes back to life in spring!

White dargo

ryanrod wrote: »

The diathane seemed to work at first.
But now hedge (since winter) has lost nearly all it's leaves and those that
remain still have that fungal spotting.

I cut it back, a gardener I was talking to said that I had let it get too
high too quickly.
So I am waiting to see how (if) it comes back to life in spring!

Thanks for the reply

When you say that the diathane seemed to work at first did the leaves actually grow back or did it just prevent further shedding?

Also did you cut it back much on the advice of the gardener? I think I may have done the same as you by letting it get too high too quickly and I think I'll cut it back and then spray on the diathane.

yop

so you think Escallonia is not a great hedge? I am buying now in next 2 week 300 hedge plants, was gonna go with Escallonia but now am not sure!

White dargo

yop wrote: »

so you think Escallonia is not a great hedge? I am buying now in next 2 week 300 hedge plants, was gonna go with Escallonia but now am not sure!

I have mine since 2002 and before this winter couldn't complain. Then this disease started with a couple of plants before Christmas and is now spreading.

A bit worrying from your perspective when you see other people surfacing on this thread with the same problem as me.

yop

heck!! maybe I need to rethink then!!

Aslorn

I've just had someone look at a cutting and they say it could be blackspot another fungus. They've recommended TLC with leaves disposed of and burned. Apparently "roseclear" is a possible solution to the ungus problem so I'll give it a try

yop

What alternatives to escalonia

armapple

Just found this forum after doing a search for "escallonia dying". Have two different varieties, and a patch in each is dying. Honestly thought it was the dog, until I took a closer look. Quite worried as it was a very trouble-free, lovely hedge for many years. Would the two very wet summers we've had be a factor? Will try some of the sprays mentioned, and the cleaning up, but we did clip each year. Another mystery garden problem (last year we became familiar with aminopyralid ... but that's another story!)

cdbrock

I have exactly the same problem extensively with my escallonia which borders 3 sides of my garden. I live in the Blackrock area of Cork city and every escallonia in the parish is exhibiting these signs. Basically they all appear to be dying. Where will all this end and what is the cause. CDBROCK

armapple

http://www.garden.ie/askgerry_answers.aspx?article=317

http://forum.gardeningmags.co.uk/forumlive/topic.asp?whichpage=2&TOPIC_ID=3437&#129796

Haven't found any real answers to what appears to be a pretty widespread problem. Everything seems to be mysteriously quiet, so it's difficult to fathom what is going on. I have always recommended escallonia up till now and I hope we get to find out what the problem is. I sprayed heavily with dithane on both escallonia types, - one is showing signs of life again which I hope will continue, the other actually looks burnt from a distance. All the best and good to see some life on this board!

mountain

escallonia hedge around our garden died off during winter as well,
but i notice plenty of new growth in the past week or so.

anyone else see an improvement?

inishindie

Hi

There's been a real surge of growth on our escallonia hedge this week.

There's a bit on the plant problems here which is useful if the shrub is leggy.

Cheers

Ian

Prowetod

Are there any other treatments available? My Escallonia has been poor for about 2 years now. I have noticed the disease in most escallonia hedges I have seen.

Anyone manage to cure their's yet?

zeppe

Made inquiries recently from McGuires Garden Centre near Dunmore East. It was suggested that the trouble may have been the result of the very wet summers and that the hedge may come back with a little fertilizer and cutting back slightly . Here's hoping.

Aslorn

Update from last year - I tried using roseclear on the hedge for 2 years and it seemed to have some effect but not much (but the roses I sprayed at the same time were the best ever!). Over this winter the hedge lost most of its leaves but this season there is great growth and it looks as good as ever with virtually no evidence of a problem on the leaves. I did trim it last autumn but not a great deal (18 inches off the top leaving 8 feet), so I don't think this was the reason for the improvement. Also, I intend to use fertilizer this year but had not done so yet. My conclusion is that the weather was the problem. Anyway fingers crossed and I hope others see an improvement this year.

IsaBrown

I've had same problem for last two years, there wasn't a single leaf on hedge at beginning of growing season, I fed with fertilizer from local farmers co-op and it's now full of lush green leaves and flowering. I noticed a few leaves yellowing with black spots yesterday so sprayed with dithane and gave it another feed. Fingers crossed.