"Gill Matthews" account I no longer havetyped

I had hoped to put some bulbs in it soon.


Oops. Then you had better diagnose the problem. Dig carefully around where
the busy lizzie roots were. if the roots are a brown splogy mass or if they
have gone gooey with grey furry appearance the you have rot. Dig down
to the
bottom of the rotten bits and chuck that away. I would also
incorporate some
sharp sand into the remaining compost to improve drainage as poor drainage
can be a cause of this problem and the bulbs won't like it either.
If the roots look chewed and less than you would expect and their are white
maggoty things in amongst them, you have vine weevils. Crush as many as you
see. If you are not organic there is a chemical called provado which
can be
watered in and will kill the little blighters. If you are organic
conduct a
careful search and squish You probably won't get all of them but you could
still get some decent results from your bulbs. There is also a nematode
which is I have found very effective, but the weather is now too cold for
the poor wee beasties to work.

Thanks.

The 'pot' is in the rain shadow of a perspex roof and drying out is
usually more of an issue than drainage. It's between a west-south-west
facing wall and the (SSE) wooden garden fence, which shades it this time
of year.

--
Helen D. Vecht:
Edgware.