Can you post a photo?

I actually washed the Alex Summers off and soaked it in the bleach solution and replanted it in a pot.

I am going to dig the second plant up this afternoon and see if it has the same white threads. I will try to get a picture then.

Never had a problem like this. I am going to call the seller today and see what they say.....

Maybe the best bet is to dig up the three new plants and throw them in the trash. Just glad I only bought three. I had a long list when I went shopping.

come on.. give us some pix ...

the ONLY time i have seen.. what you describe.. is when a weed has been pulled out of the pot.. and left its roots behind.. or in a media with a lot of raw wood ... and the fungus is doing it thing decomposing said wood ...

were the pots at the nursery weed filled???

why have you not returned them.. and what does the seller have to say about it ... you claim they are reputable????

and finally.. you are z4.. there is always a chance.. they went dormant early .... i have no clue why.. since i cant see them ... improper pot water can do that... but then i am back to wondering about this reputable source ...

i am loathe to blame them.. w/o knowing what they say about it all ...

you are going a bit chicken little here.. on a plant that rarely has disease issues .... hence the reason i am leaning toward cultural issues .... as that word is used in the garden .... i mean really.. you are ready to throw away plants.. you bought 10 days ago.. ????

are the roots intact.. fat and happy.. are there buds for next year ... ??? how about some pix???

ken

When I remember well from last fall, when plants go into dormancy, leaves dry up and can be pulled then off the crown. But when they "suddenly started falling off. They lay on the ground and look like they just rotted off the plant", that's petiole or crown rot. I had that, tried to treat it with fungicide, then some Bayer product, but finally plant dies.
Bernd

Thanks Bernd. But shouldn't the whole thing be mushy then if its crown rot. The roots are beautiful. I haven't even had them in the ground for two weeks yet.

Any idea what the white on the roots is? Kind of looks like moldy strings I guess. We had a horrible wet spring, but we haven't had that much rain lately.

I didn't think even I could kill a plant that fast. I have had some rot before, but that was in the spring when it was very wet.

Jamie, when I had that rot leaves became yellow and lay down. I could pull off the leaves then easily where petiole meets the crown, it was a slow process of decline. Some plants I dug out, cut off all mushy parts, gave the plant a 10% bleach bath. I never saw white strings, but perhaps did not look for them.
You could dig up the plant, remove bad stuff, rinse it, give it a 10% bleach bath, then repot them in a well draining mix with crown not covered with mix to stay dry. Then you could use a fungicide, such as Captan. It might not work. Otherwise, complain to the nursery showing pictures of the plants with wilted foliage, etc. By the way it is alsways good to have a fungicide around.
Bernd

The only white strings I see in the soil are very beneficial hyphae that help feed the roots. Many fungi form mychorrhizal relationships with plant roots and I suspect that is what you saw. It would explain your healthy roots and the white strings are not related to the leaf collapse.

tj

Bernd, I did dig it up, soak it and repot it. I guess we'll see what happens next. It just seems like it happened so fast. I have had some rot before, but they were just in a location that stayed too wet. That was kind of a slow death.

The second plant seems to be doing the same thing, but so far its only two leaves. Think I will just leave it and see what happens.

Tj you are probably right. The white strings have nothing to do with whats going on. I've never seen anything like that before so I assumed there was a connection.

Thanks so much for all your help

did i just read that right ...

these are fresh cut divisions??? ... cut in august ...

crikey .. if so.. that the cause right there ... and its rather normal ...

could it be done better.. probably ...

is there anything you can do.. probably not ...

you are buying a root mass for next year ... water it properly.. and wait for next year ...

are there fat buds showing up.. where the leaves are separating off???

if so,., you should be all set ...

ken

in regard to your title.. that was the thing i was answering directly ... in my first post ...

i was focused like a laser ... unfortunately ... there were subtopics.. lol ...

ken

Ken, they were new divisions cut in August. I didn't really expect them to do well this year. It was just that they looked great for about 10 days and then all of a sudden.....the leaves are on the ground and they look like they are rotting. Then when I dug into it and saw the white moldy part.....I figured something is wrong.

The seller said they don't see any problems on the original plant, so lets hope its just me being all "chicken little" Lets hope next spring they come back.

I spent the whole day trying to save this hosta. This is Southern Blight, sclerotium Rolfsii. The leaves pull off at the base of the petiole with no resistance. The little balls, the scleroti, are about the size of a mustard seed. This plant was fine last week. This is the third one to have SB.

The first one, Night Before Christmas, I tossed. That was two weeks ago. The hosta went from looking like it needed a little water to being leafless in seven days.

Today I noticed an old Undulata Univittata in an old established bed had SB. I poured fungicide on it and went looking. I found this Winter Snow prostrate. I spent the afternoon improving the hole while WS soaked in bleach. The soil had bright white stings, some so thick they were matted. I'm assuming these are the mycilliae. SP?

I'll check the UU tomorrow. SB has been documented in Iowa.

Kathy

About fresh cut divisions, an illustration to Ken's remark. Perhaps your potting mix is not well draining, so the plant rots in it. I did such to a fresh cut division this summer. Being busy with other things I potted that plant without handling the long roots properly in a potting mix which was not draining well. When I finally planted it in the ground, most of the long roots were rotted. After planting its long leaves dried up, but new fresh and healthy leaves are forming now.
Bernd

Yeah, this isn't looking good. The first one, the Alex Summers, I tried the bleach and replanted it in a pot, with new potting soil. I have kept it out of the rain. Thought it was doing better til this morning. It hasn't lost more leaves, but there is white mold traveling on the surface of the soil. I don't see orange balls, but is it Southern Blight? I know that it is in MN, but is there anything else that makes white mold on the surface of the soil?

The seller says her plants are fine, but told me to soak in a peroxide mix and let dry in the shade. I am doing that to the second one, but I am really thinking of digging up the third plant and tossing that too.

I have a hard time believing this didn't come with the plants. I have well over 100 hosta and it is only on these new ones.

So what do I do with the dirt it was planted in?

It would be really helpful if you posted a picture when something like this happens. Otherwise we are flying blind in trying to help solve a problem.

Make sure the peroxide solution is about 10% bleach and then use a cleaned and disinfected pot along with new soilless potting mix. Keep the plant completely in full shade. No fert at this time, but keep the mix moist.

Trash the old pot and potting soil.

Steve

Throw away the dirt that came with it.

The little balls are white to orange to brown and will be stuck to the ends of the petioles were they break off and on the soil surface. They are much smaller than bb's. More like the size of hosta seeds.

You have mold growing along the surface of new soil? After you gave the plant a bleach bath? I'd try pulling the mold off the soil surface, and use a fungicide on the plant.

My Undulata Univittata looked the same today as yesterday. That's a good thing. I poured Bayer Advanced on it yesterday.

Southern Blight is being reported fairly far north. Of course in exchange anthracnose has been moving south and all my dogwoods seem to have it this year. I think I noticed it on a peony today.

I thought gardening would be idyllic. C'est la guerre.

Kathy

Kathy, I'm not seeing any little balls, but we will see what it looks like in the morning. I really will try to get a picture. Is Bayer Advanced what I want to look for in a fungicide? Maybe I should just toss the plants...

I purchased the Alex Summer in a pot, and mixed that soil in the planting hole. After I started having problems, I dug it up, washed it off, bleached it and repotted it in new potting soil. It hasn't lost any more leaves since then, but the white stringy mold is traveling across the surface of the pot.

Even if I just throw the plants out, I don't know what to do with the dirt in the garden. Can you treat the dirt with fungicide and plant there again? I dug the surrounding dirt out and threw it in the wheelbarrow, but don't know what to do now.

Tebuconazole is the ingredient you want. I'd treat the area before I planted anything else there. Southern Blight typically shows up after a drenching rain that follows a longer dry spell. There's lots of discouraging info about it on the web. Most of the fungicides that are used against it require a permit.

Kathy