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Mouldy, gooey clematis :-(
Noob Gardener2
Posts: 25
Hello all,
I have a clematis montana that is suffering. It has this gooey, white sludge at its base, and a little bit of fluffy white mould on about 5 inches of the branches higher up.
I checked it over because I noticed it wasn't budding any green leaves like my other clematis is. There are some small, brown buds on the stems, but they look a bit dead. I broke open a couple of the smaller branches, and they were still green inside. What should I do? Worth a spray or not? And what sort of spray? I can't find anything on the web about gooey mould, only powdery mould!
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Ah, I think I've worked it out - slime flux. Winds the other day must have opened up some of the wood. Boo hoo
Hello Noob Gardener2,
What you are describing sounds exactly like what has happened to my Clematis montana! Even down to the dry leaf buds and still alive stems. I have also come to the conclusion that it must be slime flux, but now the question is: do I have to dig the clematis up? In a book about garden pests and diseases I found the suggestion to cut it down BELOW soil level, but will that do the trick? I don't want the infection to spread to my other clematis (one of them a montana, too, although it is about 10 metres away from the diseased one.
Does anybody know what is the best way forward?
Hi Trial and Error,
I tried rescuing it, but to no avail. The entire thing has died a very swift death. I doubt very much the infection would spread to your other clematis unless it developed a crack in its bark, and I found with mine that the slime in the diseased one ceased pretty much as soon as the sap supply ran out.
The bacteria live in the soil anyway, apparently, so I would imagine that replacing the soil wouldn't make a huge amount of difference. According to the interwebs, you should be able to replant if nothing at all recovers.
Sorry for your loss!
Thank you very much for that info, Noob Gardener2! Will cut it back to below soil level and see what happens. It's good to know it's unlikely to spread to my other clematis and that I could replant a clematis if the diseased one doesn't come back.
Yes - I should have mentioned that my other clemmy (only two metres away) is thriving quite happily, so yours should be fine
That's great! Would have been sad if they had both died!
Thanks again.