Forum home› Plants
This Forum will close on Wednesday 27 March, 2024. Please refer to the announcement on the Discussions page for further detail.

Grrr! Someone has wrecked my magnolia! Can I salvage anything?

ErgatesErgates Posts: 2,953
in Plants
Overnight, someone has chewed all but one stem off my magnolia soulangia. Just looking forward to it flowering as well.
Is there anything I can do with the bits? Any chance of taking any bits as cuttings? A bit desperate, I know, but I was looking forward to this plant doing well.

Posts

  • fidgetbonesfidgetbones Posts: 17,618
    I doubt they would root, but you could try dipping in hormone rooting powder, then inserting in gritty soil, then don't forget to keep watering through the summer.  What does the remainder look like?
  • shane.farrellshane.farrell Posts: 207
    Maybe cut some stem off to try and root and also put the stems with buds inside in a vase of water. They may flower?
  • PosyPosy Posts: 3,601
    That's heart breaking! What has done that?
  • clarke.bruntclarke.brunt Posts: 215
    I watched a TV programme "Beavers behaving badly" the other night. They'd have done it, but they were trashing the gardens in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, USA, so it probably wasn't them! And they weren't really 'behaving badly' - just doing what they do in gardens built by watercourses with lots of lovely planted trees. And weren't being treated too badly either - they were trapped and relocated to somewhere properly wild.

    You did say 'someone', but 'chewed'. Are we thinking person, or wild animal?
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    Puppy?!?! 🐶 



    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • ErgatesErgates Posts: 2,953
    Probably a deer. We have roe deer visiting fairly often. They haven’t touched this magnolia before, although a buck messed up my bottlebrush plant, caught him on the camera cleaning the velvet from his antlers.
    There is still a stem on the plant, hopefully that might recover. I’ve tidied the broken stems and stuck them in water. 
    We do have two mature magnolia trees, both taller than a two storey house, but most of the flowers are high up. Being white, they don’t show up very easily against the sky! And if we get any strong winds, the flowers can be blown away very quickly. I was hoping to have some flowers down at a more accessible position. 
    We do enjoy the visits from the wildlife, so I can’t really complain.
Sign In or Register to comment.