Adenium grows in a pot with a diameter of 20 cm. Soil mixture: humus, peat, black soil, vermiculite. Watering - as the earthen clod dries out. It is on the south window.
It produces buds, but they turn black and dry out. Please help me with advice. It’s good that the flower is on a southern windowsill - it has enough light to bloom. In many other plants, the buds often dry out due to low humidity and dry air, but it’s not for nothing that adenium is called the “desert rose”; I think it’s not a matter of humidity.
In my opinion, the plant is planted in too nutritious a mixture. Peat, humus, chernozem are components rich in organic substances. This is too much for adenium. With such a soil mixture, the watering regime may be disrupted. The soil becomes compacted and becomes impenetrable, and as a result, the roots of the plant suffer.
I advise you to transplant the flower (preferably in spring) into the mixture leaf soil, vermiculite and fine expanded clay. I usually use succulent soil, vermiculite and fine expanded clay.
When replanting, pay attention to the condition of the roots. In such a light, breathable mixture, adenium will have to be watered frequently. In the summer heat - about every other day. And, of course, for abundant flowering it is necessary to provide the plant with winter rest. Moreover, as I noticed from personal experience, adenium can also shed buds due to the presence of pests on it, rotation of the plant during flowering relative to the light, or irregular watering.
The age of the plant should also be taken into account. I had a 2.5-year-old seedling that dropped its buds for two summers in a row. The flowers bloomed only the third time. I think the point was that he simply did not have enough strength to bloom. Additional questions immediately arise. When was it: summer, autumn?
How long did adenium grow in the apartment? Was there a sudden change in conditions of detention? If adenium grows in a well-lit window at a temperature above +25 degrees, and is about to bloom, it needs nutrients and timely watering. Especially in the summer. If the plant is underwatered, it may begin to drop buds.
If the soil, on the contrary, is too wet, not only buds, but also leaves will begin to fall. The same will happen with a sharp drop in air temperature and in drafts. I am still more inclined to believe that the room has dry air, warmth, and insufficient watering and no fertilizers.
In general, watering adenium should be approached very carefully. It directly depends on the composition of the soil. Maybe there is a lot of peat in the soil mixture, and the soil dries out quickly?
Then, if there are no pests or rots on the plant, the caudex is dense, without soft areas, the leaves do not turn yellow or crumble, and the adenium looks healthy in appearance - water more often, but little by little, adding a small amount of fertilizer to the water. But only if the plant is about to bloom.
With a lack of lighting, adenium can also drop flowers without opening them.
If the adenium was purchased already with buds and transplanted into new soil, it can also lose its buds due to a sudden change in conditions, but with good lighting it adapts quite quickly.
If you bought a plant in the fall, you need to replant it in fresh soil, remove the buds, trim the shoots by 1/3 and water very moderately at first, allowing the soil to dry.
It is necessary to remove flowers so that the plant gains strength and adapts to new conditions. Because in the fall, without additional lighting, it is difficult to achieve full summer flowering.
For an adult plant, even in very good shape, this is normal. As the trunk grows, it is freed from excess leaves, they dry out and die. If the leaves dry out very much, the cause may be unbalanced soil.
Attention! A common mistake is adding coconut fiber to the soil mixture yourself.
Often this fiber is of low quality and is enriched with sea salts. Exactly An excess of minerals in the soil causes health problems for adenium. The solution in this case will be to transplant the plant into newly purchased balanced soil, manufactured in a factory.
The tips of the leaves wither
Why do the tips of the leaves dry out? A similar problem affects almost all young adeniums in the off-season. The tips of the lower leaves dry out while new foliage appears at the top. This is how the plant reacts to changes in temperature. In this situation, it is recommended to increase the temperature.
Turns yellow
Why do the leaves turn yellow? There may be two reasons for this phenomenon:
Falls off
It happens that adenium does not bloom and drops its leaves. If this happens in the fall and the number of dried and fallen leaves is small, then this is the norm for adenium. If this happens before the start of the dormant period, there may be several reasons for the shedding of leaves:
- The plant is planted in unsuitable soil. The problem is solved by transplantation.
- Incorrect pruning of the plant. When pruning, you need to focus on the size of the caudex. The procedure is only permissible if it is wide enough (you can read how to properly form the caudex of adenium and what to do if it dries and withers, and we talked about how and when to trim adenium at home).
- The plant may not have enough moisture. The solution will be competent regulation of watering.
- Foliage may fall if adenium is abruptly transferred from warm room in cold weather or it stood for some time in a draft.
It loses its variegation
Why does the variegation on the leaves disappear? If adenium begins to grow completely green leaves, there may be four reasons:
- Lack of lighting.
- General weakening of the plant.
- Excess nitrogen fertilizing.
- Degeneration (return from mutation to the original form).
For first three it is enough to correct the reasons. In the case of the last problem, nothing can be changed. The mutation process may, on the contrary, intensify and the plant will begin to grow exclusively white leaves. This is dangerous for the flower and can lead to its death. But The appearance of just a few white leaves should not be a cause for concern. Normally, this happens after pruning or in the spring and summer. By autumn the leaves will turn green.
Round spots
The reason for this type of adenium disease lies in high air humidity. The disease is fungal and after the leaves it attacks the caudex of the plant. The solution is preventative treatment with fungicides twice a season.
Burns
If the humidity of the soil and air is very high, adenium can get a bacterial burn. Outwardly, it is very similar to solar, but control methods include collecting affected leaves, treating with an antiseptic and measures to improve the soil.
Improving soil health includes treating it with special bactericidal agents.
Pests
Mealybug
An insect that lives in leaf axils. It affects young shoots, foliage and buds. Signs of damage are:
- White, waxy, cotton-like coating.
- Sugary discharge in case of long-term illness.
Adenium stops growing and begins to experience problems with flowering. Severe defeat leads to death.
Fighting methods:
- If the disease is in its early stages, the plant can be treated with a soap solution, removing the scale insects and their secretions. In the future, it is necessary to carry out preventive treatments with a weak soap or alcohol solution.
- Spray the plants with special preparations in accordance with the instructions. Repeat the treatment weekly.
IMPORTANT! The older the larvae, the more difficult it will be to rehabilitate the plant.
Bedbugs
Sucking insects that appear on pods with adenium seeds and seriously damage them. Treatment with special preparations helps in this case. A mustard solution may also help. Dissolve 100 grams of dry powder in ten liters and spray the plant damaged by pests every three days.
Caterpillars
They may appear on adenium due to transfer from other plants. This often happens when keeping a flower outdoors in the summer.
Small caterpillars or their larvae light green color and, often, are poorly distinguishable from the foliage of the plant. The insect eats holes in the leaves, and the growth of adenium slows down.
As a control measure, it is necessary to manually collect all the caterpillars from the flower and destroy them, and treat severely affected areas with insecticides.
Aphid
A sign of damage is curling leaves. When such a symptom appears, you should examine the back side of the leaves. Aphids are very noticeable. Its larvae look like gray-green insects.
Easily destroyed. It is enough to carry out one treatment with any specialized drug.
Coccids
Common name for scale insects, false scale insects and scale insects. Sucking insects that damage leaves and shoots of plants. Coccids secrete thick sticky substances covered with a black, sooty coating. It is better to fight them at the larval stage.
Adult insects are covered with “shields” and are more resistant to various kinds drugs. Most often adenium suffers from root mealybug, since the pest prefers dry, breathable soils.
Reference! The root bug feeds on sap from the roots, injecting them with a substance that negatively affects the plant. The leaves of the affected adenium fade, and the roots become covered with a white coating.
The following measures can save the flower:
- Treating the soil with special preparations (Dantop, Mospilian, Aktara). Most effective method, since the mealybug larvae are covered with a difficult-to-permeate cocoon, which only chemicals can destroy.
- Root hot bath:
- Place adenium in hot (+55 degrees) water and hold for 15-20 minutes. Then dry for 20 hours.
- Remove the flower from the pot along with the earthen lump.
- Clean the roots from the soil and rinse thoroughly.
- Cut off all affected areas of the root system.
- Wash the roots with insecticide.
- Plant in a new pot and fresh substrate.
Photo
And this is what the pests look like in the photo:
Diseases and other problems
The flower doesn't grow
Why doesn't the flower grow and what to do about it? Most often this happens in low light during the rest period. You can fix the problem by adjusting your care:
- organize a long daylight hours for the plant - 12-14 hours;
- eliminate the absence of drafts;
- maintain soil looseness;
- the pot for adenium should not be too spacious.
Why does it drop buds?
This is caused by stress (most often cold weather) associated with changes in living conditions during the budding process.
Maximum care should be taken for the plant during the period of bud set.
We talked about how to make adenium bloom at home in.
Rotting
Adenium rotting is promoted low temperature and high humidity. The top of the plant begins to dry out and the leaves fall off. For prevention, watering should be limited to winter period and in cloudy weather.
What to do if the flower is rotten? The following steps will help you get rid of rot:
Recommendation! Minimum permissible temperature For indoors adenium +10 degrees. It is also necessary to take into account that when pruned, the flower highlights poisonous juice. It should be blotted with a napkin, and all work with the plant should be done with gloves.
The branches are drying up
Due to the slow movement of juice. Having discovered a similar phenomenon on adenium, the main thing is not to cut off the dried areas - this will not help. A treatment option would be to completely coat the plant with a mixture of tetracycline and foundation and water it with stimulants. Adenium should be in bright sun.
Healthy adenium pleases the eye abundant flowering, bright tone foliage and a strong trunk. This flower responds with gratitude even to minimal care, maintaining an excellent decorative appearance all year round.
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The flowering of adenium is always a long-awaited, pleasant and exciting period. A special joy is that the peak of their flowering, as a rule, occurs in early spring and autumn: that is, exactly when we lack bright colors and freshness in the views of nature outside the window.
Of course, many adeniums are able to bloom at any time of the year, and with age, the frequency of flowering, the quantity and quality of their flowers only increase, but the spring and autumn waves of flowering, corresponding to their natural rhythms, still remain more abundant.
Obeying mysterious internal signals, adenium suddenly realizes that it is time for it to bloom - this is the culminating moment in the development of any plant, meaning its readiness for seed reproduction. 
These signals, which are sometimes called the “flowering gene” or “florigen”, are actually a whole complex of phytohormones that act on apical (tip) cells and trigger the scenario of their development as parts of the organs of the flower, and not the leaf. The ratio and importance of these substances for flowering varies among different types plants, we are interested in those that affect the flowering of adeniums in general and our specific cultivars in particular.
Most of these substances are produced during photosynthesis in the leaves. That is why sufficient lighting is the most important condition For good flowering adeniums. In the course of evolution, it seems that this factor was decisive in their development (just remember where they come from). But photoperiodism (the influence of the ratio of the length of day and night depending on the season) is not very characteristic of adeniums: in their ancestral home, the length of the day changes slightly throughout the year. Rather, the timing of the flowering season will be affected by seasonal fluctuations in humidity and temperature. But we must take into account that plants bred and grown in culture, in room conditions, are no longer so dependent on these fluctuations: the parental genes of the species have long been mixed, and the living conditions in the apartment are more equalized compared to natural ones.
However, there are often practical advice that adenium needs to be stressed in order to force it to bloom (mainly to stimulate the first flowering of seedlings that have not flowered for a long time). Stress means abundant watering, fertilizing and then keeping it dry for quite a long time. It must be assumed that it is precisely such measures that lead to additional production of signal substances, which (together with all the others!) will be the very mouse that will help pull out the turnip ( that is, make adenium bloom). It is possible that the distant ancestors of this particular adenium grew under conditions of alternating wet and dry seasons, and the mechanisms they developed to signal flowering, depending on this, were strong enough to be preserved in distant descendants.
There are other signals that encourage adeniums to flower. Age is one of them. Once they reach a certain age, they will bloom regularly (or at least set buds) even in low light conditions, but this will most likely have a negative impact on the number of buds and the quality of the flowers.
The age of the plant also clearly contributes to an increase in the number of buds laid: years will only color the adenium (especially if you still pay due attention correct formation crowns and agricultural technology).
Heredity is very important for the flowering of adeniums. According to my observations, the age at which the first flowering occurs and the average lifespan of an individual flower strongly depend on it, and to a slightly lesser extent, the number of buds laid and the ability to develop them into full-fledged flowers. Of course, serious statistically significant observations of the influence of heredity on the quality of flowering of adeniums have not yet been carried out, but if when purchasing adenium or seeds for self-growing adults flowering plants asking when and how its parents bloomed (BOTH parents - for seeds) - there will be much less disappointment in the future, and this magnificent plant will take its rightful place in the interior.
As for the ability to turn all nascent buds into full-fledged flowers, here, along with heredity, factors that we can directly influence come to the fore.
There are wonderful specimens that are completely unfamiliar with the problem of bud failure: regardless of the season and conditions of detention, they will bloom exactly the same number of buds as were visible at the birth of the inflorescence. It is difficult to say how well this quality is inherited: in the crosses of Lines 2 and , which I did, parents participated who did not lose buds under any circumstances during previous flowering; in Line 1, one of the parents sheds buds regularly. At the same time, the offspring of Lines 2a and 2b almost do not lose buds, and the seedlings of Lines 1 and Lines 3a and 3b do not bear all the buds in almost half of the cases (but the number of buds laid varies greatly). Unfortunately, the ability of more distant ancestors of these seedlings to retain flower buds is unknown.
If a specific specimen of adenium is noticed in this unpleasant character trait - the loss of part of the buds - then you can try to influence this within certain limits by adjusting the conditions of detention. Thus, during budding, neither prolonged drying nor flooding of plants should be allowed. Increased fertilization is also not required. But many note that the preservation of buds (as well as other properties of flowering) is beneficially influenced by microelements, especially boron, copper and iron. Of course, you shouldn’t go to extremes - the presence of microelements in soluble fertilizers and, possibly, their additional application in recommended doses immediately before the flowering season or during budding is enough.
Beyond the scope of this article are cases where the loss of adenium buds is associated with the activity of pests, treatments against them, and with bacterial or fungal diseases - here we are talking only about the problem of drying out of buds in healthy plants.
Flower growers adore succulents because of two features: adenium blooms with beautiful funnel-shaped gramophones, simple or double in many cultivars, thanks to which the plant is often called “ desert rose", and also because of the caudex - a characteristic thickening at the base of the stem. Having added an exotic succulent to his home collection, the plant owner is often puzzled - why doesn’t the adenium bloom?
It seems that according to all the recommendations that were gleaned on the Internet from experienced adenium growers, the conditions of detention meet the requirements, but the plant does not form buds. After carefully examining the succulent, you can appearance understand that something is happening to the flower that does not correspond to a healthy state - a disease or attack by pests. Why doesn’t a succulent that seems absolutely healthy at first glance not bloom? Having got to the bottom of the true cause and eliminating unsuitable aspects of care for the plant, you can admire the wonderful flowers for several months and twice a year.
A mature plant usually blooms in the spring, beginning to form buds in late March - early April. The second time it blooms its petals less abundantly in the fall - in early September. Adults are considered specimens that have reached a certain age characteristic of a particular species or variety.
Plants usually bloom earlier than seedlings, which bloom for the first time in the 3rd or 4th year after sowing, although in some varieties the flowers, although not as en masse as in adults, open already in the second season. However, a non-flowering young succulent that is more than 4-5 years old already causes well-founded concern for the gardener. Therefore, we must look for the reason for the refusal of flowering in something else, for example, in placement.
Conditions required for adenium to bloom
The succulent is very light-loving, for it successful cultivation it is necessary to provide a southern or southwestern location. Moreover, it does not really like its neighbors, so it is better not to place other plants in its immediate vicinity. In principle, they cannot be the main reason why adenium does not bloom at home, but attentive gardeners note the abundance of buds in the succulent after moving partners on the windowsill to another place.
Attention! Adenium can shed buds if, at the time of their formation, the plant is moved to another place with different lighting conditions or even simply rotated around its axis, exposing the back side of the flower to the light source.
During the period of bud formation, other factors in the maintenance of the succulent are also important. In conditions of high air humidity and temperature, the buds rot inside, crumble, and adenium does not bloom. Therefore, low humidity is necessary for flowers to bloom, but the thermometer in the room where adenium is grown should not be less than 18–20 degrees Celsius.
The role of the flower container in the flowering of adenium
Adenium will not bloom until it is root system will not completely entangle the entire earthen lump with roots - many flower growers, even beginners, know this. It turns out that during transplantation, a new flower container should be selected in such a way that its diameter is only 2–3 cm larger than the circumference of the previous container in which the succulent grew before transplantation.
However, the plant does not like cramped spaces. In a small vessel, flowering is less abundant than in a pot, the size of which corresponds to the size of the root system. Some gardeners practice growing several seedlings in one container. Even having reached a fully mature flowering age, such plants refuse to open their gramophones until they are transplanted into separate pots.
Can soil mixture cause flowering failure?
Soil composition also plays a role in flowering. In nature, the succulent grows on poor sandy or rocky soils of the Arabian and North African deserts, which means that at home it requires the same soil composition. In soil enriched with humus, the plant develops well and intensively grows green mass, but, unfortunately, often refuses to bloom.
During replanting, the adenium grower, when preparing the substrate for the succulent, must remember that the plant will feel comfortable in loose, breathable soils with minimum quantity organics. Consequently, although the soil mixture cannot be a pronounced direct cause of the absence of buds, it is quite capable of influencing the process of their formation.
Errors in care leading to lack of flowering
The reasons leading to the lack of flowering of adenium include errors in care - non-compliance with the rest period, as well as a mandatory component of maintaining a succulent - pruning the crown.
Excess nitrogen fertilizers
Errors in care primarily include overfeeding with fertilizers containing a high percentage of nitrogen. The plant “fattens”, increases the lush above-ground part to the detriment of the formation of buds. The gardener should remember this property of adenium and give preference to those fertilizers for succulents that contain a minimum of nitrogen.
Improper care during the winter dormancy period
Failure to observe a dormant period can also be a reason for failure to bloom. For adenium, it occurs with a reduction in daylight hours, and caring for the flower at this time requires a reduction in watering, no fertilizer, and a decrease in the room temperature to 15 degrees, preferably not higher than this figure, but not less than 12 degrees. If the grower does not comply with these conditions, he may not wait for the plant to bloom in spring.
However, some adenium growers believe that the flower requires stimulation of flowering, which consists of maintaining a low temperature and no watering. Often the plant takes a long time to recover from such stress, sheds its leaves or long time looks weakened with drooping leaves and. You can make adenium bloom at home by correctly following all the rules for caring for a flower that is at rest.
Pruning is not a mistake, but too drastic is the reason
Pruning, as an obligatory element of caring for adenium, can also be the reason why the plant does not bloom at the right time, if it is done radically, “under the stump”. Adenium growers remember that consistent flowering of the plant can only be achieved on young prunings of the current season. If there are few of them, then few flowers will be produced, so in early spring, to stimulate the formation of more buds, the succulent is cut off or the tops are pinched.
However, if there is a need, as a result of which most of the crown is removed, flowering will have to be sacrificed. A similar situation arises when pruning the root system during the formation of the caudex. Until the plant recovers from all the manipulations and grows new roots and a young crown, it either blooms sparingly or does not form buds at all in the immediate future after pruning.
Diseases and pests of adenium are a common reason for failure to flower.
Often, during the dormant period, the grower violates the plant’s watering schedule, moistening it too much when the adenium content is relatively cool. As a consequence, rotting of the root system and caudex occurs. The plant looks tired, weakened, lower leaves turn yellow and fall off, we are not even talking about flowering at all; a diseased succulent certainly does not have enough strength to form buds.
In such cases, you should save the flower as soon as possible, because if the process from the rotten caudex rises higher along the stem, it is easy to miss the moment when you can still cut off the top and root at least a small apical stalk or it on a healthy seedling. With valuable varietal specimens, delay and loss of time threatens to lose a rare plant.
The only salvation is to detect rotting as quickly as possible and take all necessary measures to eliminate it: cut off the damaged part of the succulent, treat the remaining part with antibacterial agents, dry it and plant it in a fresh substrate, subsequently maintaining a very gentle watering regime.
Once exposed to pests such as mealybugs and spider mites, adenium weakens and is also unable to prepare for flowering. When inspecting the plant, you should special attention pay attention to the underside of the foliage - ticks and their larvae often hide there. Scale insects can be easily detected by the presence of characteristic cotton balls in the axils of the leaves.
Acaricide treatment is used against spider mites, and scale insects are eliminated using systemic insecticides, not forgetting to water the soil, because some types of scale insects lay eggs not only on the plant, but also lay eggs between the roots. Having gotten rid of pests, you should not stimulate the plant to flower; it is better to give it the opportunity to rest and recover from the invasion of parasites.
Why do buds and flowers fall off?Very often we ask the question: “Why do buds or flowers fall off?” The fall of buds or flowers can be caused by dry air, poor lighting, excess nitrogen, or moving the plant from one place to another. Most often it can be a consequence of a lack of light and moisture, as well as exposure to cold air. Majority indoor plants resistant to cold, but not frost. Sudden drop in temperature warm room or dry cold cause many problems.
Let's consider the reasons for the fall of buds and flowers according to the most famous and common indoor flowers:
- Azalea - during the period of flowering and budding, the plant cannot be moved from place to place or rotated (even the slightest change in the refraction of rays can lead to the buds falling off). The fall of buds is also affected by drafts and very high air temperatures in the summer.
- Adenium - may drop buds due to the presence of pests on it, rotation of the plant during flowering relative to the light, and irregular watering. If there is insufficient lighting, it can drop flowers without opening them.
- Achimenes – with the appearance of the first buds you need to apply mineral fertilizer once every 2 weeks. An annual spring replanting into nutritious soil is also necessary.
- Balsam - by dropping buds, it most likely reacts to short-term drying of the substrate. This can also happen from lack of nutrition, from temperature changes, from too many buds - the plant cannot feed all of them and sheds some of them - this is called self-regulation, and from many other reasons. If the buds do not bloom, there may be several reasons: lack of light, lack of nutrition, excess nutrition, too low a temperature, drying out of the soil, dry air or replanting.
- Begonia - bud drop can be caused by water getting on them, dry air or insufficient watering.
- Gardenia – during the period of bud and flower formation, the plant does not tolerate temperature fluctuations. Irregular watering causes the buds to drop. Sometimes there is a massive fall of buds, which depends on dry air, drying out the soil in the pot, and a drop in temperature of less than 16 degrees. The buds may not open during long periods of cloudy weather. During the period of budding and flowering, it is not advisable to rotate the plant.
- Hibiscus (Chinese rose) – during budding and flowering, the hibiscus should not be rearranged, moved or turned, as this will cause the buds or flowers to fall off.- Gloxinia (sinninginia) – there may be several reasons for the buds to fall off. When the tuber is healthy, good large leaves, the buds fall off due to lack of nutrition for them. Give a comprehensive mineral fertilizing containing microelements (“Flower”, Sudarushka” or others). Spray the air around with water, but not the flowers and leaves. Do not allow the earthen clod to dry out or drafts. Hybrid Gloxinias are more demanding temperature conditions(it should not be lower than 17 °C).
- Zygocactus (Decembrist, Schlumbergera) - the plant sheds buds or parts of segments on the leaves when the temperature is too low, insufficient watering, moved to a new place, excess fertilizer, damage by pests or diseases, and it is also necessary to check the roots.
- Camellia – at high temperatures there is a risk of buds falling off. And also when plants in the budding phase are moved to another place (changes in light conditions affect).
- Medinilla - With a lack of light, medinilla may not bloom or drop flowers. During flowering or budding, do not turn or rearrange the pot.- Orchid - sometimes sheds buds. There can be many reasons for this behavior. Check to see if you have overwatered or dried out the roots? Have you gotten too carried away with fertilizers? Was the room smoky? Was there a sudden change in temperature, cold air from somewhere? Isn't it hot in the room?
- Roses do not tolerate dry air and high temperatures, especially in winter, this causes the leaves to become smaller, dry out and crumble, buds do not form or flowering does not last long.
- Fuchsia - violation of the watering regime, insufficient lighting, too much warm air or moving the flowerpot.
