Avocado root rot

Hi,

i have two little avocado trees. The first is almost completely dead, all leaves were coming off over a few months. I repotted it, the roots look almost completely rotten. It's that short because I pruned it before it lost all it's leaves.

The second looks ok, but i don't want to risk it losing it too. Any ideas what i can do? I have a layer of vermiculite in the bottom of the pots to provide better drainage, the soil is a mixture of commercial potting soil and vermiculite. I spray a lot and water seldomly.

 

Oh, i forgot. There's no vermiculite in the right (good) pot, but perlite.

And i applied a half inch layer of peat moss casing to the sick one.

 

Looser soils! Try replacing at least 50% of your mix with orchid bark to improve drainage, and maybe try plastic pots with generous drainage holes. Clay pots like those do tend to kill avocadoes.

 

I have about 40% potting soil, 30% vermiculite, 30% cactus-soil.

The peat-moss-clay is just on top since i heard that casing is good.

 

Then you still might be watering too much. Other than that, I can't think of a reason for root-rot with Avocadoes; they normally grow here in marginal and even somewhat swampy soils.

 

But do you think it's possible to rescue the larger pot?

 

Yes. Repot again, being careful to tease the dirt out from the roots, and since you've got a fast-drainage medium I'd just use more of the same. You'll likely lose the leaves, but they'll regrow once the plant reestablishes itself.

If you find any rotten bits, it kind of goes without saying that you should prune them off with sharp, sterile cutters.

 

Ok, did you mean the same pot (the one without leaves).

I'm not sure about the vermiculite / perlite in the soil thought, doesn't it keep too much moisture?

 

I'm sorry - I thought that the larget pot was the one that still had leaves. If it's the leafless one, then now is definitely the time to address any rotten roots by pruning and definitely to change the pot itself (I'm paranoid about this - I'm never sure if there's something funky lurking in pots that have killed or harmed plants, even after boiling out, so I generally change them).

You might try this one without vermiculite / perlite - sub in more bark for their percentages. That way, you'll be able to see in the recovery process of the tree whether or not they're adding to the problem.

 

With the bark you mean bark chips / bark mulch? How larger should those be?

 

I'd look for what's sold as "orchid bark" - smallish chips of partially decomposed bark.