Is my wisteria (sinensis) dead, dormant, or just stubborn?

I bought 2 small, bareroot wisteria last fall and put them in an extra large container. I have yet to see any growth at all. Same with my smoke tree. What gives?

It is possible that they never came out of dormancy. Since you bought them bareroot, they must have been dormant. Also, if the extra large container was too large and held a lot of wet unused soil, the roots could have rotted. It is always best to pot bareroot things in containers slightly bigger than the rootball and water lightly until you see new growth. Then again, you are in a colder zone so perhaps your wisterias haven't woken up yet? Someone in your zone will have to tell you if they have growth. My wisteria bloomed months ago.

my wisteria are growing but no sign of flowers yet, I was told to prune to the ground and cover with mulch in my zone, but I have since read if you prune to the ground they will take a couple of years to bloom, anyone else heard this?



Doris

i takes a long time for wisterias to bloom depending on types some 7 years some up to 20 years.


if you prune it before it ever flowers yes it will take longer to bloom. i leave mine alone . if there are dead parts after its starts to leaf out and stuff then i will cut those. mine is 3 years old and hasnt bloomed yet.

if there are no leaves or anything then check the roots. dont pull it up as you may uncover shoots at the roots.

also remeber wisteria are shallow growers. so might be planted to far down.

Thanks everyone! I will check the roots to see if there is anything growing at all. If not, I may just stick them in the ground somewhere and see if that does anything.

Imzadi, are you sure that wisterias are shallow growers? I don't think that is true. I have mine in 25-gallon containers, and they are rootbound! Wisterias have a main tap root which runs quite deep and another network of roots in addition to the tap root. They have nitrogen nodules attached to their roots. They can send up new shoots from roots near the surface if that is what you meant.

Doris, wisteria blooms on old wood so there is no way to get flowers if you cut yours to the ground each year. You must have at least one-year old wood to have flowers. Now we are talking here about Chinese wisteria, Wisteria sinensis and Japanese wisteria, Wisteria floribunda. Both are hardy well below your zone so you don't have to mulch or cut yours back. American wisteria, Wisteria frutescens, flowers on both old and new growth, and that one is hardy to Zone 6 and is considered less invasive: http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/1351/index.html Also, flowering usually occurs before the vine leafs out or at the same time that the vine leaf out. It can also bloom again sporatically during the summer, but that is rare.

About flowering, most cases of wisteria refusing to flower comes from the wisteria not getting full sun. Also, if a wisteria is grown from seed, it can take a very long time to flower, such as five years or longer. Because of this, most commericial nurseries sell plants which are either grafted or started from cuttings or root cuttings. These wisterias should flower right away if given the right conditions.

Zone 5girl, check for healthy white roots. If you only see brown roots, then it is likely the wisterias are dead.

Waaa! There are only brown roots, but I did see one tiny white root, only about 1 mm long. I know this is a total long shot, but I watered them with rooting stimulator in the hopes that it will help. I hate throwing them out! If there is nothing going on in a few weeks, I'll check the roots again. If they look the same, I guess they'll end up in my compost pile. :-(

Sorry about that, Zone5girl! If you are interested, I've purchased a few wisterias from Bloom River Gardens, and they were very nice vines: http://www.bloomriver.com/reFrame.asp?page=/root/viewPlants.asp?ID=7