Plant Problem Diagnosis Key / Growing conditions
Growing conditions
Overwatering (low root oxygen)
Media that stays saturated pushes the air out, and roots without oxygen stop taking up water and nutrients. The plant wilts in wet media and the lower leaves yellow.
Signs
- Drooping, heavy leaves while the media is wet.
- Lower leaves yellowing and dropping; slow growth.
- Fungus gnats; media stays wet for days.
What favors it
Watering on a schedule rather than by need, poorly drained mix or soil, and pots without drainage.
Prevention
- Water when the root zone needs it; check by finger, pot weight or a moisture meter.
- Use pots with drainage holes and a free-draining mix.
- Water less in low light and cool weather.
Often confused with
DiseaseRoot rot (Pythium and Phytophthora)
NutrientNitrogen deficiency
Growing conditionsDrought stress (underwatering)
Sources
- Overwatered Indoor PlantsUniversity of Maryland Extension
- Tree Problems Caused by Excess WaterUniversity of Maryland Extension
Treatment by crop
Cultural, biological and chemical options in the order to use them, and notes written for each crop.
Identification is free. Treatment is on the Home and Pro plans.
Questions in the key that lead here
- Look the plant over, leaf undersides included. Are insects, mites, slugs, eggs, webbing or droppings on it?
No, only damage or discoloration - Where is the problem?
The whole plant or whole stems - How is the soil or media?
Moist or wet - Lift the plant or pull back the media at the stem. What do the roots look like?
Few roots, media soggy, no rot
Not a match? Start the key or describe what you see.
More from university Extension: search Extension pages on overwatering, or find a plant diagnostic lab through your state's Extension.
Other growing conditions
- Blossom drop
- Blossom-end rot
- Cold and frost injury
- Construction and root damage
- Drought stress (underwatering)
- Edema (oedema)
- Fruit cracking
- Girdling roots and a buried root flare
- Heat and light stress
- Herbicide injury
- Leaf scorch and drought stress
- Light bleaching
- Mower, trimmer and animal injury
- Normal fall needle drop
- Not enough light (stretching)
- Road salt injury
- Southwest injury (winter sunscald and frost cracks)
- Sunscald
- Transplant shock
- Winter burn of evergreens