Whats wrong with my rose of Sharon?

[leoturt]

In Western Canada, I would keep my ROS in a nice large pot, fertilize well and once it starts to get cold/(before frost) i would bring inside to a location with SUNSHINE and keep it growing through Winter. You can pick & feed leaves throughout Winter. (Thats what i do with our Hibiscus here in MD)

I'd like to do that, however, since I just bought them from a garden store like a month ago, I've been told by ppl on here to wait for a year before feeding any of the plant since they most likely have pesticides on them. The brand is Proven Winners. Also, you probably didn't know this, but I sprayed them with diluted dish soap water a few days ago.

Arent ROS hardy? Where I live, it like never goes below -4 C outside.. they probably won't grow leaves if I leave them outside during that time, right? I'm guessing they go dormant if left outside?

 

[leoturt]

Did the roots appear to be healthy when you reported it?
How moist was the original soil when you removed it from the pot?
If the roots were healthy (and not root-bound) and the soil not soggy, then you probably did not need to repot it and you probably weren't over-watering.
If the roots were unhealthy I probably would have just discarded the plant. If it was root-bound, I would have reported it in a slightly bigger pot. If the soil was soggy, then you probably were over watering.
If you had spider mites you should have noticed webbing on the under surface of the leaves. Sometimes you need a hand lens or zoom in with your phone camera for close inspection. I doubt it was spider mites, however, because 1) they leave tell-tale signs (webbing as I mentioned) and their feeding injury cause a speckled or mottled chlorosis, not uniform yellowing like in your picture.
Horse manure is not a great fertilizer for potted plants. It's salty and you don't have good control over the amount of nitrogen you are adding, and it may be lacking in other nutrients that are needed.
A high quality hibiscus fertilizer would probably work a lot better and there isn't anything inherently bad about conventional fertilizers in terms of imparting some kind of toxicity to your plant. Obviously you don't want your tortoise to directly ingest any fertilizer particles or leaves that were sprayed with a foliar fertilizer (or Dawn for that matter), but application of an appropriate fertilizer, following the recommended rate (or less, as you wish) should be safe.
I wouldn't trim the plant at this point, or under water it. Water it appropriately and see what happens. Don't apply anymore Dawn unless you know you have insects.

Good luck,

Matt

When I was repotting it, the roots looked healthy, were quite root bound, and not soggy. The soil was dry (I repotted 2 days after I last watered it).
I've just been told on here to repot any plant we get from the garden store and use organic compost, if we're going to feed the plant to our tort later.

I have noticed some tiny red spiders on the leaves, and there some small webs throughout the plant, I think also under the leaves and around the edges of them. I assume it's spider mites but I don't see many of them. If it spider mites, then the plant was probably infested with them when the plant was still at the garden store before I bought it, though I could be wrong because the plant looked pretty healthy at the store. I never knew about these things until recently. I'll inspect the plants more next time I buy one.

I never heard of hibiscus fertilizer. I will look into it. Luckily I only put a tiny amount of horse manuer.

 

[leoturt]

Might be kinda useless, but here's new pics of the plant I just took.

 

[Matt Fidelibus]

Might be kinda useless, but here's new pics of the plant I just took.View attachment 297817View attachment 297818

It looks like it's heading in the right direction. Keep it moist but not soggy. Good luck.

 

[turtlesteve]

Just as an FYI, I hit mine (pictured earlier in the thread) with some high N fertilizer and the new growth has greened up a little bit. Too soon to tell for sure, but looks positive.

 

[leoturt]

Underside has more yellow leaves

 

[leoturt]

With the repotting of my 2 ROS and my hibiscus and using my own mix of soil, when I watered the plants, most of the water just went straight thru the soil and out the bottom of the pots. Is is bad that that happened and is my soil too easily drainy? I only watered them somewhat when I watered them that time.

 

[leoturt]

With the repotting of my 2 ROS and my hibiscus and using my own mix of soil, when I watered the plants, most of the water just went straight thru the soil and out the bottom of the pots. Is is bad that that happened and is my soil too easily drainy? I only watered them somewhat when I watered them that time.

Also, at the bottom of the pots is a layer of rocks. And I now put the pots each have a saucer underneath..I feel like the saucer is kind useless since there's rocks at the bottom of the pots and so the water in the saucers wouldn't be taken up by the plant lol

 

[Matt Fidelibus]

Also, at the bottom of the pots is a layer of rocks. And I now put the pots each have a saucer underneath..I feel like the saucer is kind useless since there's rocks at the bottom of the pots and so the water in the saucers wouldn't be taken up by the plant lol

It's actually not a good idea to put rocks in the bottom of the pot. It doesn't improve drainage like you would think it would. You should use the same potting media throughout the pot.

M.

 

[leoturt]

It's actually not a good idea to put rocks in the bottom of the pot. It doesn't improve drainage like you would think it would. You should use the same potting media throughout the pot.

M.

Crap.. okay I'll take the rocks out once I think the soil has taken the shape of the pot. Not sure how long that will be tho but hopefully in a few weeks

 

[turtlesteve]

Also, at the bottom of the pots is a layer of rocks. And I now put the pots each have a saucer underneath..I feel like the saucer is kind useless since there's rocks at the bottom of the pots and so the water in the saucers wouldn't be taken up by the plant lol

This is somewhat of a misconception. Letting water sit in plant saucers is a good way to kill plants. The saucer is there to keep water from leaking onto the floor. If by chance you water too much and the saucer is full with water, you should move the plant and dump it.

Rocks don’t do anything because the soil will get between them. For it to work like people think it does, you would have to cover the rocks with some fine screen mesh to keep the all the dirt out.

 

[Pastel Tortie]

Crap.. okay I'll take the rocks out once I think the soil has taken the shape of the pot. Not sure how long that will be tho but hopefully in a few weeks

Hold off for a while... See how the plant is doing first. If the plant is doing fine in a few weeks... or months... Don't bother repotting to remove rocks if the plant is doing fine. That's more of a "while you're at it" kind of change.

 

[Pastel Tortie]

With the repotting of my 2 ROS and my hibiscus and using my own mix of soil, when I watered the plants, most of the water just went straight thru the soil and out the bottom of the pots. Is is bad that that happened and is my soil too easily drainy? I only watered them somewhat when I watered them that time.

Some water is going to run through when you water... Otherwise, it would indicate there wasn't enough water, or there's a drainage problem.
If you want a general idea of how wet the potting medium is, you can stick a dry object (pencil, dowel rod, plant stake, your finger, etc.) into the pot (in the soil) and see how damp/dry it is or how much soil clings to it when you pull it out. That method works well when the top of the soil is dry, but you can't tell if it's still damp enough underneath to not need water again, just yet.