Lavender dying from the bottom up

This is about the fourth plant this season that I've had the same trouble with. They are just fine and really pretty most of the season and then they start getting brown at the base and the plant continues to die off from the base up. I've had this with marigolds, straw flowers, one perennial I hadn't identified and so on.

Is it a fungus? I don't see any bugs so I don't think that's a problem. I sure am tired of losing all my flowers!! I'm hoping someone has an idea....

Here a pic of the lavender. -- Vicky

How much water are they getting? It could be rot from overwatering combined with too much humidity--they do better without much of either. I think lavenders would be tricky to grow in FL because of their love for dryness. I'm not sure why it's happening to your other plants too though, they should be less sensitive to humidity and tolerate a bit more water, but if they're in the path of lawn sprinklers that get run frequently or if you've been getting a lot of rain lately that could be too much for other types of plants too. Just a guess though, could be something else.

Well the lavender has been happy -- it's even blooming while it's getting that brown stuff going on that you see in the pictures. Below shows the straw flowers that had the same problem. I water when we're not getting rain but I can't say any of the effected plants were overwatered.

The brown stuff in the pic of the lavender still looks like some sort of rot/fungus to me, it's not the same brown that you get when a plant dries up because of too much heat or too little water or something like that. Overwatering is all relative--I agree that your watering practices sound reasonable, but lavender really doesn't enjoy a lot of water, so I still think overwatering is a possibility at least for it--if lavender has well established roots, they can survive an entire California summer with no rain and 20% humidity and just occasional watering, so even just your natural amount of rainfall may be more than they'd like. If they're not well established yet then they need a little more, but even then rainfall plus supplemental watering when you haven't had rain may be too much. Have you asked in the FL forum if anyone else has had success growing lavender? There are some types that are a little less sensitive to water and humidity than others, still not sure if any of them are going to really thrive in FL but one of the more tolerant ones will give you the best chance.

The other possibility especially if the other plants you've seen this on are in the same area of the garden is that it's some sort of soil born fungus, but I'm not really an expert on that at all so I can't give you too many suggestions. If it's a soil fungus, spraying the plant with something isn't really going to help and it's very difficult to get rid of a fungus from the soil, so the key would be to find out if there are any plants that aren't susceptible to it (many fungi tend to impact certain families of plants but not others) and plant those in the area instead. Unfortunately you need to know what fungus it is in order for that approach to work--hopefully someone here will have some ideas, or you could try taking it to your county extension office and see if they can help you. Some soil-borne fungi won't cause problems until you get a little too much moisture in the area, so watering a little less than you do now may keep you from having the same problem next year, although again since you live in a humid environment and probably get a decent amt of rain in the summer that may be enough to trigger problems all on its own, so finding plants that are resistant is probably the best approach.

vcb - I'm in zone 9a near Houston, and we can't grow lavender worth a darn here - or many of the Mediterannean plants. I think we have the same environment. ecrane is correct - they like it dry, and we are just too humid. I have had some luck with a Spanish lavender, but even it is short-lived. I would say that you just have the wrong plant for your area.

Hi ya VCB1... I'm right up the road from you in Titusville, FL!

Good luck with the lavendar... I've never been able to get it grow past the seedling stage. :-(

I recently had to cut back my 3' lavendar to the ground. It appears you have new growth so not all is lost - let's hope. Cut it back to about 3-4" and cut off the dead parts. With any luck, assuming your watering is correct, you'll have a new, healthy, blooming plant in no time.

It's a lot drier in Arizona. Well, is that an understatement? LOL Lavender doesn't like humidity. No harm in trying, I just wouldn't count on any miraculous recovery.

Well my lavender had done really well for most of the summer -- this variety anyway. I do have another variety that has never been happy although it's holding on so far.

ecrane3, I wondered about a fungus myself. But I don't know much about them nor do I know what to do about them. Three of my four effected plants were in the same general area. Although I also have other plant in that area that weren't effected.

I'm wondering if the lavender got messed up when I emptied my hot tub. I cleaned the hot tub out to make it into a "pond." In the process I dumped gallons and gallons of water on the concrete and it drained down through the lavender. It's possible I guess, but doesn't explain the other plants I've had this brown stuff on. Hmmmm...

Hey LAKelly! You are indeed right up the road. I guess we're kind of at opposite ends of the county. Great to "meet" a neighbor here on DG!

-- Vicky

Well, the amt of water that they got when you drained the hot tub could have been a problem, and I'm sure that chlorinated hot tub water (especially if it was a fairly large quantity) wasn't good for them either! But I think lavenders are always going to be sort of touchy for you given the climate, some years you may have good luck with them and others maybe not, or they may go on fine for a while and then all of a sudden develop problems. As far as the fungus, if you had a bunch of plants in the same area that were affected it could be a soil-borne fungus, many fungi have a some families of plants which are susceptible to them but other families of plants that aren't, so it could be that the plants in that area which weren't damaged aren't susceptible to whichever type of fungus you have, and the ones that were affected are susceptible.

It wasn't chlorinated -- the hot tub had been sitting catching rain water for quite a few years. But I still think fungus might be the culprit for all the reasons you mention ecrane3. Do you know what to do to eliminate it?
-- Vicky

If it's a soil borne fungus, then I don't think there's really a way to get rid of it, you just need to avoid planting stuff that's susceptible to it in that area and/or avoid creating conditions that are conducive to fungal growth. If you have plants that get fungal spots on their leaves, you can control that to some extent by avoiding overhead watering and splashing water on their leaves, but the problem you have looks like it probably started from the base of the plant, so just avoiding overhead watering probably won't help. The other thing you can do is plant more moisture tolerant plants in that area, they probably won't be as susceptible to the fungus. Or you can try cutting back significantly on watering in that area, many soil borne fungi won't cause problems unless they're combined with too much moisture in the area so if you keep things on the dry side that'll make your lavender happier anyway and could prevent the fungus from causing problems. That trick works pretty well out here where we have no humidity and no summer rainfall, but in your climate the natural rainfall and humidity that you get may encourage the fungus even with no additional water from you.

Thanks ecrane, that's good advice. I noticed yesterday that the lavender is losing ground but amazingly, still blooming! Poor baby, LOL! Anyway I appreciate the advice and I'll also keep an eye on this area to further troubleshoot.

-- Vickjy

Vicky, I had the exact same problem with my lavender. I actually replanted twice. This last bunch seems to be doing better than the first two, but now it's cold here, and we'll see how it winters over this year vs. last year.

There are a couple of things that might help with lavenders... They like really good drainage, so planting them in a raised bed, or even raising up a little hill in the garden to sit them in would help... In FL, clay probably isn't a problem, but in OH you might need to amend to loosen up the soil around them. DeBaggio suggests mulching lavenders with an inch or two of pea gravel, which reflects light/heat up into the branches of the lavender to help keep it dry on top.

Good luck... it's such a gorgeous plant that it's worth playing around a little before giving up on growing it. :-)

Makes sense, critterologist. The soil has been amended, but come to think of it, it's in one of the more damp parts of the garden. I'll have to remedy that! Thanks!

Thanks for the insights critter and all. I think my best solution is to move my lavender. I've discovered that the place where it's growing gets quite a bit of run off water -- which I didn't realize before I planted it. It's worth a try anyway.

-- Vicky