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Azalia covered in moss
Christine L
Posts: 8
We have a very old, very beautiful and highly scented yellow Azalia. It's branches and trunk are covered in moss. It isn't particularly shaded, nor crowded. We lost another of this type last year. Is this a symptom of it's demise, or is there anything I can do to help. We also have a few others in different spot that look reasonably healthy - I'm guessing a light pruning might help these live longer??? But I am frightened to prune the one covered in moss in case I cause more of a problem for it. These Azalias are at least over 60 years old. It would be such a shame to lose another.
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Wow that is an amazing age! Azaleas are prone to moss and lichens growing on them and whilst these are not harmful to the azalea they can sometimes indicate a lack of vigour in the plant and at 60 that may be the problem you have. Try feeding the azalea more often than you do and see how that works. Do not prune unless you want to remove any dead bits.
Thank you for the advice - I will try that. Someone suggested tomatoe feed - is that recommended? Or some general purpose compost?? It hasn't been fed in the last 60 years, so hopefully a bit of tlc will help.
Would pruning not regenerate fresh growth lower down? I'm thinking about the other old azaleas that are looking ok at the moment - although they are crowding into each other.
General purpose would be better as tomato feed is to promote flowers then fruit. You could give it a tidy trim but you may lose some of next year's flowers.
There are soluble plant foods specifically for azalea, rhododendron and camelia ie ericaceous plants. Miracle gro do one but I'm sure there are others. Something like that would give it a boost.
Mosses might indicate an over-wet environment.
Lichen is harmless, seen much more now since the demise of coal fires and cleaner air, pruning for more air circulation might help with the moss. This has worked with a couple of shrubs here but not azaleas, they don't grow here.
In the sticks near Peterborough
Thanks very much for all your words of wisdom. I will take some time to give these shrubs some care and attention. My family are farmers and live on this estate that used to have 8 full time gardeners in its hay-day. I am only just in a position to have some time to tend to the gardens - and that is only part time. So, from 8 full time gardeners there's me at 56 yrs old - part time - and my brother with a chain saw for the overgrown wild Rhodo's and cherry laurel
. It would be such a shame to lose these beautiful plants - the smell from this yellow azalea is worth it - plus its size. It is in an area with 5 very large Maple - A shame the area cannot be maintained because of cost, but is still beautiful.
What beautiful pictures. Thank you for including those.