Heuchera 'Lime Marmalade' help!
lloyd_shooter
Posts: 10
in Talkback
Evening all
Just looking for some advice on some Heuchera Lime Marmalades I've planted in my garden along the border.
I planted them last August and they looked great until a couple of months ago. Of the 7 all but two have flowered and now look pretty sad for themselves. The border is against a 2 metre fence and is easterly facing. Lot of sun until about 3pm, then shaded. The pics I've included show how close the healthy one is to the withered one. I thought these were hardy plants. Soil is moist and slightly clay based.
Any help much appreciated as they look great in the garden and I don't really want to lose them.
Thanks in advance for any help.
regards
Lloyd
0
Posts
Hello Lloyd. The heucheras are hardy, but I find some colours to be more finicky than others and the lime green ones are the finickiest for me.
When mine go like this I consider the options. Leave them to die quietly or do something. Often I do something. I cut the damaged leaves off one by one until I am left with a nub of new, undamaged leaves. I feed the plant and leave it to make its own mind up about what it wants to do in life. Sometimes I'm lucky and sometimes not.
Another thing you can try is to pull off any small side shoots and pot them on as cuttings. Some of them take quite well to this treatment.
I would agree with the above comments - did you check for signs of vine weevil grubs, in the roots? They can turn a perfectly healthy plant into a wilted dying mess within a week!
I agree with Verdun and in my garden, the lighter the colour, the more shady the planting position. My yellow ones do well and get much less sunlight than yours, Lloyd - east facing, sun gone by 11am. I've found a real 'good doer' is Key Lime Pie in clay soil.
My Key Lime Pie loves being in almost total shade in the summer; it gets more light when the trees have dropped their leaves. It is not very vigorous; I have to protect it from encroaching Corydalis, but if I keep up to scratch on that it does well.
I love heucheras, esp Obsidian, but I've given up on them because of vine weevil. They seem to get all of mine in the end.