Hi, I pruned my Hibiscus plant, for it has mites. New leaves started to grow back, no mites found, but yesterday I found that leaves became lifeless and some of them turning yellow. Most of the leaves look like they are dehydrated. I haven't changed the schedule for watering and really don't know why it is happening. Should I cut these lifeless new stems (1-1.5 sm long) and leaves? I put it under the plastic bag and lights for now. I worry that they will dry out eventually unless I cut them. If I do have to cut them, can someone suggest where...is it right where I cut previously? Thanks in advance Lara Here are the images:
I would not cut any more off the plant. How did you get rid of the mites? Pruning would not do it. You might want to check for mites again. You really have to make a few treatments with some sort of pesticide to get all of them. Treatments usually don't kill the eggs and new ones hatch quickly.
Hi Eric La Fountaine, I think they were mites: very little (almost couldn't see them on the leaves), different color, some were red, yellow, green, black, and gray. I googled for the info on the internet, found some pictures that look alike, and concluded that they were mites. They were moving fast. But they didn't look like the mites on orchid. Orchid mites are bigger and grey-brown in color. Also, hibiscus' leaves were covered with very small spider net. I checked the plant every day and couldn't see it until I put it under the sunset lights. I can't use any chemicals due to having pets at home. I cut the plant, washed, srayed with soap detergent (Sunlight anti bacterial), and changed the soil a few times, but I didn't separate the roots, so I guess eggs could be there... Please, let me know if you think that what I did is not enough. I bought new violets and I'm going to the orchid exposition this Sunday. Now I'm worry that those incects will get to my new plants. Please, help me!
I think the things you did were good. Detergent solution is a fine pesticide for mites, but they often take more than one treatment to get rid of (eggs), so you may want to spray again. Tropical hibiscus can be difficult and will often drop leaves when they are not happy. Keep giving it TLC and hopefully it will recover fully.
Eric, thank you very much for your answer! I spray them every two days, now less frequently. But what about the roots? I will change the soil as frequent as I can, but I didn't destroyed the soil in between them. There are even some type of material like a cloth around the roots. I know that there are some mites that live in the roots. Should I free the roots from it and the "old" soil that in the roots? I just eliminated the small white fast running insects (I don't know the name in English), they were destroying the roots. One of my hibiscuses dyed because of, I guess, the combination of mites and the other creatures. The dead hibiscus (seems like it was rotten inside, although it looked dry) was in the same pot with the other hibiscus, the secod survived for now. I'm not sure it will recover...
You may want to use the Search Function (on the green bar at the top of the page) to look for other threads on hibiscus, there has been a lot of discussion about them on the forums. There are also some great resources online that could give you more detail about treating for pests.
Hi everyone, my plants were getting worse, so I decided to wash it again and found that more roots are got rotten. The place which is right below the surface of the ground (where roots are starting to grow) looks comletely rotten. I don't have experience with Hibiscuses and I don't know if it is natural color for these plants or it is slowly dying. I hope that it shown on the pictures. When I cut a little bit of the stem in that place (I tried to cut out the rotten root), the structure of the stem is like if it was frozen, greenish and watery... it looks different than if I would prune the healthy plant. Does the rot got into the stem? Thanks
