Hi biffa11157,

Is the plant drying out and wilting at all?

Is it possible that the plant is root bound? If so, I would re-pot it into a larger pot. And Fertilize it.

Do you snap off the seed pods?

Keriann~

It's not unusual for the older lower foliage to yellow and drop but you shouldn't be losing many of the younger leaves. It sounds like they are getting enough sun and probably enough fertilizer if they are flowering. I'm not sure what zone you are in being in the UK. Are they growing in containers or planted in the ground? It could very well be that they are root bound like Green Thumb said if they are container grown. They should be in at least a 20" diameter pot. If you don't want to deal with a large container a smaller pot can be sunk into the ground and easily lifted, if necessary, in the fall. They tend to grow larger when planted inground. Allowing seed pods to ripen has never affected the growth of my brugs. A pic might be helpful.

Thanks for the advise guys, I have four plants all in pots, I got them last summer and they did well, I was told that they would not survive the british winter so I left them in pots so that I could bring them into my garage until spring, I was also advised to cut them back by a third, which i did but they all seemed to die back to just a stump which then started to sprout new growth and this year they got to about two to three feet in height. was this the right thing to do?

If you are only dealing with small brugs, I tend not to cut them back unless you are limited as to where you can store them. There are no simple rules when dealing with living things in different conditions. I trim my brugs to suit whatever shape I am after.

If your brugs died back to stumps, I'm guessing that you let them dry out too much over the winter. Each house is different, the duration of your furnace running varies and the type of winter varies. I check my brugs every couple of weeks to see how dried out they are. If the stems are starting to shrivel - I give them some water; but, just a bit. Too much water and they will think it is time to grow.

:)

My Daturas always stayed small until I got them in morning to 2pm sun, gave them fert. 3 times a week and snapped off their seed pods.

Now they are over 8 feet tall and are covered in blooms.

Keriann~

Hello Biffa, welcome.

'Lots of flowers on a 2' plant?' Are you sure you don't have a datura? It's a common misconception that the daturas are brugmansia but are not. Same family though, and both called trumpets. Flowers point basically up on a datura, never right down but sometimes nod sideways. Brugmansia flowers never grow upward, they dangle like a pendant straight down or nod outward sideways.

- Sandy