Welcome to the forum!

Hostas are dormant in the winter months. I would guess it is an undulata (not known for its attractiveness in the late season to begin with) that is getting ready to go dormant.

If you can stand to leave it be until the foliage is dead (remove the dead foliage) that would probably be best. If you can't stand looking at it the way it is, then chop the foliage off and stick a container of mums over the spot for now. The new hosta growth will start in late March or April and be beautiful until mid summer.

Alexa

Hey greenlydia!!! Happy to see your humorous self over here on the hosta forum. The ponders shouldn't get to have all of the fun. ;)

Alexa is right-on. This is ugly time for hostas. Mine look poopy and droopy - browining up...holes...you name it. You'll fall in love w/ it again in the Spring.

Andrea

Welcome Greenlydia! The others are right (others - sounds like some sort of cult) it's probably just the ugly time for hostas. Just one thing, you said you put it in good soil....is that good soil for hostas.......very well drained....just a thought.

What do you mean "you don't spend the night out there"......we do....LOL

June

Thank you ladies, and I use the term loosley. I think I shall just leave well enough alone and see what happens next year. Ugly as it is, I can't bear to chop it down and whatever is eating it must really need the nourishment, so they are welcome to it. The soil I put it in was a commercial potting soil, a good brand, so I'm going to assume it drains well. The water never stood around trying to look like my pond, since YOU know what I mean Ademink! (check out the "bulb" forum and see if you can add anything to my total lack of knowledge of corms.......) I think maybe I should just toss them in the pond for the Koi!
Again, thanks for the advice and I'll let you know if you all owe me a hosta next year! Snort!
Greenlydia

I was so upset a couple of years ago at this time. I had bought my first Hosta and it was beautiful all summer. Then for no apparent reason it was withering away.
Needless to say I was very happy in the Spring when it suddenly reappeared.

Didn't know that what was suppose to happen LOL.
The good news is, I decided to find out more and that is what led me here to all you helpful people.
Brenda

It's even uglier today, if that's possible, and even my chickens can't be bothered to look for good, crunchy bugs on the poor old thing. I still love it and together we shall press on towards next Spring and if all goes as promised, I will become a member of the "Hosta Cult." And thanks Caliloo for telling me I own an "undulata" which sounds like a body part I don't really want to touch without gloves on! Now, if all of you will head over to the "corm" section and help me out there, I'd appreciate. Those "corm people" are assuming I know stuff I don't and they scare me!
Greenlydia

Welcome Greenlydia,

Its so sad to see them decline isn't it?? I feel like they're dying, but I know they're just getting ready to go to sleep for a few months.

Your hosta is Undulata if the center of the leaf is white and the rest is green, but if the white is on the edge of the leaf and the center of the leaf is green, then you have albo-marginata.

Again, welcome!!

Donna

Hello Playinmud..........would it be Ok if I just owned a "hosta?" I've named it Sybil because it's gone thru so many changes lately. My thing-a-ma-jig growing on the trellis I named Princess Poop because it's just sitting there not doing it's "covering your trellis with hundreds of beautiful and fragrant flowers throughout the summer," thing. OK, I sorta promise to learn the names of things I plant, but people give me stuff all the time and tell me it's name and then I forget it so I just call it as I see it. I have a yard FULL of thing-a-ma-jigs, Sybils and Princess Poops.........and there is one really nasty and invasive plant someone promised me wouldn't travel and is now trying to break down my front door I have named..........oops, this is a family show, right?
Greenlyida

Nothing witty to say here...just laughing...amen on the 'undulata' comment! You are indeed a hoot Greenlydia...

Speaking of body parts not to touch w/o gloves, I don't do corms. Sounds like a job for a podiatrist. I'm going to go check out whatever on earth you are talking about but no promises for anything other than laughing or heckling. hehe

Ademink...........if you laugh at me I will write the PondersBible group and tell them your pond is really your bathtub and the only fish you own are rubber!
Greenie

:P

hehehe

Hello Ademink..............my hosta is looking worse than my water hyacinths, which is very bad, but that is yet another job I've put off.....removing the yucky stuff from the pond. I get so overwhelmed this time of year for some reaon....there's just so much to do to get everything ready for the winter. I've been working on the pond almost daily but don't seem to be making much headway. I swear the hyacinths are STILL "at it" if you catch my drift, because it doesn't seem to matter how many I yard out of there, the next day there are still as many! I've been slowed down a little because I was getting my chicken coop ready for the winter, ya know, sweeping out a summers worth of chicken poop, knocking down the spider webs, laying fresh litter for the "girls" when in my zeal to do an extra special job, I slipped on a rather large and gooey pile of chicken poo and went sailing out the door, landing on my ankle which then made a rather sickening cracking sound. When I tried to get up, I realized my foot was no longer pointing in the direction of the house, but due South, which even in my limited knowledge of human anatomy I knew was wrong. So now I am trying to do everything I have to do with this stupid cast on which leaves my toes hanging out for some reason and they freeze, so I have to take frequent medicinal whiskey breaks. I know I could put a sock on it, but then how would I explain being sloshed at 2 in the afternoon? Life is just one damn thing after another, eh?
See you in one forum or another, I hope!
Greenlydia

Oh my goodness! This thread is absolutely the funniest thing I have read in a month. Greenlydia, please stay around. Talk about hostas or anything else that crosses your mind. Your take on the world of gardening is priceless.

Jeez, laughing my head off as usual! That STINKS (and probably did) that you broke your ankle!!! You know it was a freak accident that was allowed to happen to you just so you'd have more great fodder for stories. lol Slipped on chicken poop and now sippin' on the bottle. Sounds like a country western song. lol

Well I went out to clean meee the hen house
They are my girrrrls I'm their faux spouse
Threw down some litter
and cleaned to a glitter
No-booody was stirring not eveeeen a mouuuuuuse *insert guitar strums*

Stepped o'er to kill me a spider
For I'm not a lover I'm a fighter
Stepped in some poop
Threw me for a loop
And now I must pull an all-nighterrrrdrinkin'whiiiiskeeeey

Ok, so I'm a bad CW song writer. lol

I also cleaned the WH out of my pond (my first year for them) and they also have a mini brothel somewhere in the netherregions of the skimmer or something. It's like if there's even a tiny bit of root, it's on! Although they say they don't overwinter, I think they are building a biodome somewhere in there.