My hedge is dying

[Martijn Offenberg]

Help!

For the past few months my privet hedge leaves have looked muddy (they have
a slight brown tinge on them that can be rubbed off)

The right hand edge of the hedge has been pretty thin for a while and seems
to be getting worse, so I popped down to the local garden centre to buy a
few new privets to fill up the gap.

After being educated that people don't plant hedges in the summer, I also
mentioned the grubby leaves and was told that I had to remove the whole
hedge, burn it, dig out the soil and then replace the lot.
I was also told that I can't put the same stuff back but must use something
like Holly as my garden is infected with Honey Fungus and if I didn't do it
immediately all my plants would die.

The hedge is about 6' tall and is the only thing seperating my garden from a
busy road. Given that new hedging is 5 quid a plant at 2 foot high and 30
quid a plant at 3 foot high, I would do almost anything to be able to rescue
my current hedge rather than have no privacy for the next 3-4 years.

Is this possible?

Also does it sound , albeit from my poor description, that Honey Fungus is
what I've got? A search on the internet led me to Armillaria and none of
the symptoms I've read about mention muddy leaves.

Hope someone out there can help and has better news than the man down the
garden centre.

Martijn Offenberg

[Kay]

Martijn Offenberg wrote

>Help!
>
>For the past few months my privet hedge leaves have looked muddy (they have
>a slight brown tinge on them that can be rubbed off)
>

Oh! I remember that from the privet hedge in my parents garden when I
was a girl. I thought it was a feature of *all* privet hedges ;-)

That hedge is still going strong 40 years later btw.

--
Kay
k...@scarboro.demon.co.uk

[MuckEpup]

In article <6sh0ib$b...@romeo.logica.co.uk>, "Martijn Offenberg" <a...@b.com>
writes:

>After being educated that people don't plant hedges in the summer, I also
>mentioned the grubby leaves and was told that I had to remove the whole
>hedge, burn it, dig out the soil and then replace the lot.
>I was also told that I can't put the same stuff back but must use something
>like Holly as my garden is infected with Honey Fungus and if I didn't do it
>immediately all my plants would die.
>

Have you seen the honey fungus? It's a small beigey colour (hence the name
honey, I gues :-)) toadstool that grows usually near the roots of shrubs. They
do look a little like other typse of toadstool though, so you may need an
expert of a book to help identify it. I thought I had honey fungus last autumn
(and was horrified!) but it turned out it wasn't :-)
My rose book says:
"On the roots of attacked plants you will find black 'bootlaces' produced by
the fungus. Romove and burn dead and dying plants with as much of thier roots
as possible in order to prevent the disease from spreading. Before replanting,
using Armillatox might be a wise precaution."

[Martijn Offenberg]

MuckEpup wrote in message
<199809031425...@ladder01.news.aol.com>...

Thanks for your reply,

I've not seen any toadstool type things in my garden at all. In fact I
thought the honey fungus was the brown powdery stuff on the leaves of the
privet. I've also not seen any "bootlaces" so hopefully it isn't honey
fungus but something else.

Now the question is
What is it?
How can I get rid of it?
Will it be ok to plant new privet in the hole created by the bit that died?

Hope you can help,

Thanks

Martijn

[MuckEpup]

In article <6sor3n$s...@romeo.logica.co.uk>, "Martijn Offenberg" <a...@b.com>
writes:

>Now the question is

>What is it?
>How can I get rid of it?
>Will it be ok to plant new privet in the hole created by the bit that died?
>
>Hope you can help,

Errm, pass! ;-) I've only been gardening about 4 yrs and my privets are doing
brilliantly (so far, touch wood).
AND I don't know where my pests & diseases book has gone! (mind you a good
guess would probably be my pests... sorry, son's ;-)....pigsty(read: bedroom).
He seems to have pilfered a load of my gardening books!!

[Peter]

In article <6sor3n$s...@romeo.logica.co.uk>, Martijn Offenberg <a...@b.com>
writes
>Now the question is
>What is it?
>How can I get rid of it?
>Will it be ok to plant new privet in the hole created by the bit that died?
>
>Hope you can help,
>

>Thanks
>
>Martijn
>
It is probably Rust fungus. If it were my hedge I would spray the whole
hedge with a systemic fungicide every two or three weeks up to the end
of October. I would also make sure the hedge had a good mulch of grass
cuttings and spread some of the ash from a garden bonfire along it too.
I reckon it would recover by the spring with that treatment.

Regards
--
Peter