Transplant HELL!

J

Jimbabwe

Member
5
17/05/13
0
21
Placerville, CA
Hi,

I'm new here. I have just transplanted four Plant.jpg crotons (picture BEFORE transplanting is attached) from a 12" diameter pot into a 20" diameter, 12" deep pot. The roots in the old pot were so intertwined there was hardly any dirt, only roots. I separated all the roots very gently and planted each croton separately in the new planter.

It has been about three weeks. Most of the leaves have fallen off. The soil is still slightly moist. I tried watering it at the beginning and it didn't help. I watered it a little last week to see if there would be any change and there wasn't.

What can I do?

Please help.

Thanks,

Jim
 
Welcome Jim! You may have killed off some of the delicate roots by separating. The plant (looks like Petra) just went into shock. I would keep it out of the sun until it puts out new roots and misting the leaves may help. Now that 3 weeks have past, and they still have some leaves they should be fine. Good luck!
 
Water the heck out of a plant about to be transplanted whether potted or in ground. High humidty also helps before and after transplanting. Keep the tranplant well-watered for a week or so after. Keep new transplant out of direct sun.

However, most crotons will bounce back even if ripped from the ground and then planted a day or two later. Just keep them well-watered and be patient...
 
Hi Scott, Hi Phil,

Thanks for your advice. One of the plants has lots all its leaves.

Phil, somewhere else I found a statement that I shouldn't water the transplant very much afterwards because the roots will rot. Anyway, it WAS well watered after transplanting but it still became dry. The soil is still moist but not wet.

Should I prune it to get new leaves to sprout or just keep waiting?

Oh, and maybe my wife poisoned it (not really)! The name of my girlfriend before her is Petra! Ha ha.

Jim
 
Placerville, CA - current relative humidty is 37% - yikes! if the RH gets that low around here, everyone complains about dry skin, wilting plants, etc. Rough even for a abuse tolerant plant like Petra. Much depends on what kind of potting soil you're using. With a really good freely draining soil, it's almost impossible to overwater a croton. However, if the soil has the consistency of asphalt pavement or black sludge, drainage will be a problem along with root rot.

At any rate,with a bit of TLC, your Petra should bounce back over the summer. Keep the soil moist and keep the plant out of full blazing sun.
 
Hi Phil,

There are still a couple of leaves on the four plants, some of which are completely dry and some of which have a little moisture. No new leaves.

Should I prune the plant to get the leaves to sprout?

Thanks,

Jim
 
Jim -
If this were my plant, I'd keep the soil most and keep the plant in shade. The low relative humidity out there is not helping even with a croton like Petra which was supposedly bred for indoor environments. Recall that crotons are really tropical plants and do best in a tropical environment - which is why here in FL crotons in Miami looks better than those in St. Pete, and those in the Keys are better yet. The key ingredient now is patience.....

Good luck with your croton
 
Jimbabwe said:
Hi Scott, Hi Phil,

Thanks for your advice. One of the plants has lots all its leaves.

Phil, somewhere else I found a statement that I shouldn't water the transplant very much afterwards because the roots will rot. Anyway, it WAS well watered after transplanting but it still became dry. The soil is still moist but not wet.

Should I prune it to get new leaves to sprout or just keep waiting?

Oh, and maybe my wife poisoned it (not really)! The name of my girlfriend before her is Petra! Ha ha.

Jim
Click to expand...
Just keep it well watered and as phil replied pinch all of the branches. But what ever you do never say you really love this plant in front of your wife it might suffer a sudden disease known as glyphosate blight
 
Woo hoo!

After all four plants losing ALL their leaves and the plant looking quite dead for a month, I had kept watering it. Then I noticed that where the leaves had been attached started to look slightly green. I thought I was just seeing things. But, it started coming back! Leaves started sprouting and now, even after I thought the one plant that didn't show ANYthing after the others all had some new leaves, IT is sprouting!

So, all of them lived! Great!

Thanks to all of you for the encouragement.

Also, thanks to my wife, who I asked to keep Petra wet while I was away on business! She's a great sport.
 
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