Rhododendrons and azaleas are blooming again!
For years, I wondered why my rhododendrons and azaleas, despite fertilizer, etc. are so lazy. Instead of the flowers they had black buds, which could be crumbled between the fingers and I thought that frost damage.
Until my neighbor - a gardener's daughter - explained that this is no frost damage, but that so-called rhododendron cicadas have deposited their eggs in the buds. The affected buds must be removed because they are a constant source of new infection for a fungus that grows through the entire winter during the winter.
So: In between, every now and then search the plants and remove the black buds. But do not throw on the garden floor or compost - but dispose of it properly in the trash.
I have beautiful flowering rhododendrons and azaleas again!
