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

My poor beleaguered star jasmine.

with.usurawith.usura Posts: 8
in Problem solving
Hi all. We've got a trachelospermum jasminoides that thrived for about three years (so much growth that it lifted the trellace out of place!) on our very shady terrace in a pot. It then had a very rough autumn / winter in 2022. First a very resistant scale insect infestation, followed by intense winds. It dropped a lot of leaves in winter, and now that it's shown some tentative new growth in it's upper tendrils but absolutely nothing has come back on its lower reaches.

My question - if I want a nice bushy plant should I prune it back? If so when and by how much?

Photo below shows its present state!

Thanks in advance for any advice! 

Posts

  • with.usurawith.usura Posts: 8
    Apologies for the sideways photo! 
  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,147
    How big is the pot and when was it last repotted with fresh loamy compost?  

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





  • Pete.8Pete.8 Posts: 11,340
    I've had several of these plants over the years and they perform best in a really sunny position.
    They also want to be huge plants, so there's a chance that it may be very pot-bound.
    Have you checked for that?
    If it's in a pot it will need feeding too during the growing season.

    The photos are rotated by this site, not you.
    It started a few years ago, but we're still waiting for it to be fixed.

    Billericay - Essex

    Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
    Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
  • Papi JoPapi Jo Posts: 4,254
    Right side up

    This plant will never grow happily in a pot, much better in the ground. If you have no ground, then switch to another kind of plant which will be happy in a pot.
  • Busy-LizzieBusy-Lizzie Posts: 24,043
    I was just about to turn your photo but @Papi Jo has beaten me to it!

    I have grown them in pots. I had quite a big one at my old house on a sunny south facing terrace on the stone wall of my house. It did very well, though always suffered a bit in winter but picked up with the warm weather. Over about 12 years I re-potted it into bigger pots with new compost about 3 times. I fed it when I fed the roses and I watered it, a good soak, about 3 times a week in summer. Though it survived without watering for 2 weeks when the house sitter forgot when I was away!

    I was given one as a housewarming present about 2 years ago. It was quite small but it has grown and I keep it bushy by pruning off long tendrils when they appear. I think yours could do with a fresh pot, though I can't tell how big your pot is. Mine, at the moment is 45cms, in 2 or 3 years it will go into a 60 cms pot. The best time to re-pot is late winter, early spring. They can get quite tatty in winter with reddish leaves that fall off. Use a compost mixed with John Innes 3 which is loamy.

    Yours could also do with pruning, quite a bit, at least half. Then snip off the ends of stems you want to be bushier and they should make side shoots. The best time is after flowering, though when mine grows long tendrils I just snip them back. 

    Have you fed it? Do you water it regularly? Do it get a decent amount of sun? Is it in a sheltered place?

    My 2 yr old. The photo makes it look smaller than it is. Pot 45cm, plant nearly a metre.

    Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
  • with.usurawith.usura Posts: 8
    Busy-Lizzie said:
    I was just about to turn your photo but @Papi Jo has beaten me to it!

    I have grown them in pots. I had quite a big one at my old house on a sunny south facing terrace on the stone wall of my house. It did very well, though always suffered a bit in winter but picked up with the warm weather. Over about 12 years I re-potted it into bigger pots with new compost about 3 times. I fed it when I fed the roses and I watered it, a good soak, about 3 times a week in summer. Though it survived without watering for 2 weeks when the house sitter forgot when I was away!

    I was given one as a housewarming present about 2 years ago. It was quite small but it has grown and I keep it bushy by pruning off long tendrils when they appear. I think yours could do with a fresh pot, though I can't tell how big your pot is. Mine, at the moment is 45cms, in 2 or 3 years it will go into a 60 cms pot. The best time to re-pot is late winter, early spring. They can get quite tatty in winter with reddish leaves that fall off. Use a compost mixed with John Innes 3 which is loamy.

    Yours could also do with pruning, quite a bit, at least half. Then snip off the ends of stems you want to be bushier and they should make side shoots. The best time is after flowering, though when mine grows long tendrils I just snip them back. 

    Have you fed it? Do you water it regularly? Do it get a decent amount of sun? Is it in a sheltered place?

    My 2 yr old. The photo makes it look smaller than it is. Pot 45cm, plant nearly a metre.

    Thank you for this! I repotted it a year ago - no sign of being bound and the roots look healthy when I had a look at the end of this winter. Current pot is 53cm and the plant is a little over a meter tall (it's a wide angle photo hence the distortion). 

    We soak/feed regularly through the growing season and it usually does brilliantly despite the relative shade of where we are in inner London surrounded by tall buildings.

    Thank you for the advice about pruning. We've actually seen some good buds emerge this last weekend. Once it finishes flowering I'll prune it back by half.

    Again thanks to everyone for their contributions. We're growing in a tough space (small 1st floor terrace that faces North - East) and this is one of the few plants we've found that usually thrives here!



Sign In or Register to comment.