The stranger who came into my garden in broad daylight and attempted to steal some hostas.

Teresa

That would be me LOL.

Becky

For me its nematodes as well.

I bought a Lakeside Partydress on ebay last year and didn't know what was wrong with it (don't forget it was my 1st year buying hostas, I was clueless), so I moved it all around to see if it would do better in another location. In doing so, I infected three of my hosta beds. I've had to stop buying from this seller, because one of the plants I received this year, was also infected. I threw that one away and treated the bed with the insecticidal soap. So far no signs, we'll see what happens.

I'm in this fight for the long run, I won't throw away some of these, they're too precious to me.

And yes, nematodes do travel...we've had so much rain this year, they probably rode the "waves" to other plants.

I can't undo the nematodes, so I'm moving forward and looking ahead to when these are beaten into submission and gone. Heh, heh, heh they'd better watch out, I'm going to enjoy the fight!

PIM

Lack of time. I needed to be able to spend much more time in the hosta beds, but the sun beds demanded much more attention. I also need to set up a system to deliver water to my hosta on a regular basis.

Diann

I thought slugs were a problem until I learned that I have nematodes.
It has taken a lot of time and hard work, especially boiling water and carrying it out to the infected hole. If I have to do this next year I'm going to put more thought into it to save my back, not to mention the mess in my kitchen. I think I'll buy some of those cheap camper propane stoves with burners and boil the water outside, NEXT to the hole. My water comes out of the kitchen facet
at 130 degrees so I'll also have to figure out a way to get that hot water at least to the garage and do the treatment there. Having my hubby drill holes with his new toy, a gas powered post hole digger, has been a real help. Many of the plants divided during the process. I now have little 'hosta hospitals' planted under trees everywhere. lol

I had 2 of them. First,was the late Spring freeze,that almost wiped out my montana-Aureomarginata,and made my Sagae lose all of it's first flush of leaves,then came the hailstorm in April,which made a lot of hostas look bad the rest of the year,and almost completely wrecked the Sagae. Other than that,it was a pretty good hosta year! Phil

Deer and drought!

I spent the entire month of August moving soaker hoses around. I kept all the hostas alive and looking half way decent only to have most of them chewed to the petioles by the hooved vermin a couple of weeks ago. GRRRRRRRR.

Alexa

Sassy I know this may sound expensive, but I was thinking of getting a cheap cooler at the end of the season (I think I missed it, so next season) to stew my hostas in. The insulation of the cooler would keep the water at an even temperature a lot longer than in a pot or pail. I'd set it outside, fill it up and heat treat the hostas where ever. You could even close the lid to ensure even heating. What do you think?? After you're done, you could store hosta tools in it or something.

Mine was definitely Nematodes. I believe I bought the affected hosta and did not know better. Read a couple of threads about nems on the forum and realized I had a problem. I threw out both hosta showing signs. In hindsight, I wish I tried the heat treatment.

Slugs were hard to control this year too. I just purchased my special spray can to supplement slugo with the amonia treatment.

My third enemy was grass. In my perennial bed, I had this grass radiated out from a huge Baptisia plant. For four years I planned to dig it up and didn't. Trying to weed it out did not work because the roots ran long and deep and ended up under other plants. Well, guess what I have been doing all week. Tore up the whole area, probably 10 X 10'. Removed the grass and an allium that I loved when it was in bloom, however it looked like weedy grass too. When the area is clear, I will plant a new white butterfly bush, an endless summer hydrangea and put back some iris and daylilies.

playinmud, that's a great idea and I have an extra large cooler too. I've been using a tall plastic kitchen trashcan, but the insulated cooler makes much more sense. Does anyone have a good idea how to get the 130 degree tapwater outside to the cooler without having to carry it? Carrying it is doing a real number on my back.

Slugs wrere bad this year, but nematodes were really bad. I read with interest everyone who had increased problems, and a lot of those people live in Ohio. HeyJ, you and I pretty much get the same weather, it's been a pretty wet summer.. I really think the darn nematodes are in the ground, no matter what we do, and it just takes the right conditions to bring them out. I had signs of nematodes in hostas that I've had for years, and never had signs of them before, and weren't anywhere close to other hostas that have been infected...

None of it makes sense to me.

Sassy I'll probably rig a garden hose up to the faucet when I do this. There's got to be some type adapter that would work. Hmm, this gives me something to think about. Trekking outside with pitchers of hot water sounds like it would take an eternity. LOL!

Lynne I am making headway with the insecticidal soap concoction I mix up. I'm going to do one more treatment this Saturday and then call it quits for the season. The thing to do will be to clean up all the leaves from these plants once they're "gone".

I also read somewhere that in Europe they tried pouring the hot water right on the plant before they emerged in Spring and had good results. I'll search the web for that article. I thought that was really interesting, instead of digging up the plant you treat it in the ground. I seem to remember that the water had to be hotter than the 130 degrees though.

A very pushy black bear. He came and SAT on several areas of the garden and tipped over entire large planters scrounging for the walnuts that are now falling all over my garden. I'm glad it's the end of the season. Pictures to follow. McT

A BEAR!?!? My gosh! I'd be scared to death if I knew a bear was in my yard. It's bad enough that I have to worry about my 2 toy size dogs outside to potty with coyotes around, but a BEAR??? They'd go nuts, especially the chihuahua, he has no idea he's a chihuahua. He believes he's a Great Dane. A BEAR???? And I'm concerned about nematodes!

LOL Sassy!!! I am such a "visual" person with a great imagination! I can clearly see the scenes you have so graphically (dare I say "graphic---?")in my mind!

Little dogs, always think they are so much bigger, don't they! I think it must be their "defense mechanism", to bluff so much that it confuses the bigger animals! I mean, think of the mental processes the big guys go through, looking at such a "gnat" carrying on like it could tear through a brick wall without blinking, shaking if off to turn around and take on an elephant's leg, without missing a beat!! LOL

I wish I had time to make a "graphic" of that one!!! LOL

janice

Why aren't you bringing the hostas inside to heat treat them?

moles

Ademink, I think your question was meant for me.
"Why aren't you bringing the hostas inside to heat treat them?"

Answer: I have been doing the heat treatment inside this year and if I have nematodes next year I'll find a way to take it outside. It's such backbreaking work, plus it destroys my kitchen.

Here's what I've been doing.

1. Dig up plant
2. Shake off dirt in driveway
3. Cut off leaves
4. Put plant(s) in tall plastic trash can.
5. Carry to kitchen.
6. Run hot water till its as hot as it can get (Mine is 128- 130 degrees).
7. Test temp of water with a candy themomenter.
8. With trash can on floor, use rinse/sprayer & spray hot
water in trash can till it covers the entire plant.
9. Set timer for 10 min. (the plant cools water down so I
add 5 minutes to the treatment.
10 Meanwhile, boil water on all 4 burners in the largest
kettles that I own.
11 When timer goes off try to get plant(s) out of hot water
without burning hands!
12 Put hot plants in cold water immediately till cooled off
13 Next, drag plastic trash can across kitchen floor
14 then down two steps into the garage
15 then across the garage floor
16 then out to the gravel driveway and dump hot water out
17 Boiling water on stove should be ready. CAREFULLY,
18 Carry heavy kettles of boiling water across kitchen,
19 down two steps into the garage,
20 out garage (all theis time trying not to scald 3 dumb
cats that want to lay down in front of my feet as I walk
21 Continue to carry boiling water to hole(s)
22 Pour boiling water on shovel
23 Fill entire hole and surrounding soil with boiling
water.
24 Find a place in yard away from bed(s) for a
hosta hospital.
25 Dig new hole(s) (or tell hubby to use his new gas
powered post hole digger)
26 Plant the treated hosta
27 Label plants
28 Water well

It's been an experience. I can see why kines decided to pitch his infected plants instead of treating them. I thought of doing that several times BUT #1 I'm too cheap
and #2 I hate to give up on things. I hope that they make it ok.

Weeds....weeds....and more weeds.

My dog is my worst enemy. She is a black lab and every now and then she goes on a digging spree and it's always in my hostas. I'm ready to kill this dog! Not really, but she's defintiely driving me crazy. I've tried some stuff from a gardeners' catalog to keep cats and dogs out of gardens and I've also tried cayenne pepper. Neither one seems to help. Any suggestions?

Hmmm... nematodes, southern blight, drought, slugs.
(haven't seen southern blight this year, but I'm always watching for it)

Neighbours stealing plants. I cant have any unusual plants planted near the driveway, because they wont last 2 days. At least I can kill the slugs!!

Donnie

Oh my goodness, Donnie! It's happening on your side of the world, too? Now I'm really nervous about the 7 pots of 'August Moon' sitting in my whole new planting area, in front of my house tonight.

I purchased two full pots of it today, and divided them up with at least 2-3 eyes each and came up with the 7 at a final cost of around $4.28 each pot!

I chose the 'August Moon' for the color and also because it can usually be found reasonable in cost these days
and I had hoped that no one might be as tempted to dig them up, since they are so inexpensive by comparison to so many!!

I'm thinking I might run out and bring them in now! LOL

My biggest enemy this year is definitely the lack of rain! They are all doing fine, because I am able to keep up with watering but it has been a real task this year due to the watering restrictions and the extremes I've had to go to, to harvest water to use on them!

janice

I'm with hostarox on this. My biggest problem KNOW is moles.. I know there only going after the earth worms in the beds but I get tired of pushing minis back in the ground cause the BEEPING moles think it's a play ground and do laps threw it. Now if you'd ask this question about 2 months ago my reply would've been the hard freeze for a week when the plants were fully leafed out here :-( Ask again in 2 weeks and I bet I say drought lol.. We got 5.4 inches here in "down pours" the last three days so now it won't rain for another month. Typical weather where I'm positioned in Iowa.

DEER. So far, they have munched down a nice Olive Branch to two leaves, gave one of my Stripteases a Mohawk haircut, and took the top third of the leaves off a 2' high Guacamole. I moved 3 huge undulata marginatas to my back beds only to find stalks (and not many stalks) the next day. Deer repellant thus far hasn't helped.

Coming in 2nd is whatever is digging up my hostas, roots and all and leaving them next to the hole. "Flowers for my Farm" thinks it is a skunk digging looking for grubs or cutworms!

Third is root rot; they were first year plants and all came from the same vendor. I believe that nursery had some problems this spring with the freeze, etc. and have replaced all the plants with nice, even larger ones.

Char

For me,as well as Janice,it has been lack of rain! We're almost through June,and if it doesn't rain soon,it will be 2 months,and only 2 inches for those 2 months! This place is turning into the desert southwest! (NC,that is!) It's so dry that even weeds are dying,and that says something,because weeds are impossible to kill! Still no rain in sight. This may be my last year for growing hostas. Phil

It used to be weeds...and weeds...more weeds. But now in 2007 it's the discovery of infected Lady Guinevere, Shade Fanfare, Choo Choo Train and Striptease...all infected with the virus HVX. After hosta gardening for 5 years, I may have a major problem on my hands.

Papou

Oh no, Papou!! Were those plants planted for 5 years before showing the signs??

janice

This year it's the lack of rain - we keep getting threatened with thunderstorms that don't materialize and it's been very hot. Lugging the hose around is getting to be a fulltime job.

Oh and new this year - dog poo in the back garden. Yuck!! I tend to be barefoot. Any ideas on discouraging this?? I do have cats but they are typical felines - they either come in to use their nice clean litterbox or they bury it (lol).

June

Myself. I need to stop buying Hosta's. I hate to say it but now I am weeding out the less desirable's.