Ceanothus

[Suziebun]

Hello

I'm finding a lot of people have lost mature Ceanothus shrubs this year in the uk. Is anyone else having this? Was it the bad winter we had following the very hot summer or is there a new disease/pest in the country?

[MelanieSW]

Yes I can confirm that, the 2 ceanothus in my front garden did not survive winter, and I've heard it from other people locally too.
It was the frost periods I think, my summer jasmine also died back to the ground. And I could see that in both cases stems were split due to being frozen and defrosting a few times presumably when sap must have been rising.

[mrsbusy]

Yup my Ceanothus was completely killed off by the winter weather along with a clump of bamboo (hooray) but I see that it is sending up new shoots (oh no!) and a 3 other evergreen shrubs.

[Babru]

The cold may have killed your ceanothus, but they are also quite short lived, so that could be the reason. According to Burncoose Nursery "The lifespan varies in different growing conditions. In higher rainfall areas they grow quicker and many live only 10 to 15 years. Where conditions are drier the life span may be extended." I had a lovely standard one here in Edinburgh and it lasted a bit over 10 years.

[Nicos]

We lost our well established plant during the winter of maybe 2009?… the garden hit a low of -11C.. The local bakery lost theirs at the same time - and theirs was as high as their gable end.We lost a few other well established plants then too.

What were your lowest temperatures this past winter Suziebun?

Mine here has been ok so far. Planted after a -18C which hasn’t yet reoccurred.

Baru…that 10-15 years seems to fit in well with my experiences!

[mrsbusy]

The cold may have killed your ceanothus, but they are also quite short lived, so that could be the reason. According to Burncoose Nursery "The lifespan varies in different growing conditions. In higher rainfall areas they grow quicker and many live only 10 to 15 years. Where conditions are drier the life span may be extended." I had a lovely standard one here in Edinburgh and it lasted a bit over 10 years.

Yes that's true - short lived plants but I put mine in 3 or 4 years ago so I am putting it down to the weather or some other problem. Same as the others - apart from the bamboo which was here when we moved in 30+ years ago! It is very well behaved and keeps to it's space - just looks a bit odd in an English garden IMHO.