Help save my border!

[SmallGreenBabies]

Hi everyone! Garden obsessive and first-time poster here 👋

Several shrubs near each other in my garden border have suddenly got poorly 😢 Sambucus black lace is wilting, cistus tips are going brown, and cornus leaves are browning. They're declining rapidly and will be dead soon I think. They're a few years old.

I'm terrified it's fungal, but could it be conditions? I'm in north east England on heavy clay and it's been extremely wet the last few months, but relatively little rain in the last few weeks. What can I do? Thanks!

Keep your fingers crossed that it’s the abnormally cold and wet soil this spring. By all means prune off dead wood but clean your secateurs afterwards.

If it’s honey fungus, you may find black “bootlaces” under the bark.

The RHS says there’s no effective treatment for honey fungus other than digging out. If you dig out, RHS have produced a list of plants according to their susceptibility

Another possible cause is Phytophthora, but note that the symptoms are very similar to those caused by waterlogging, so waterlogging remains your most likely cause.

I think it’s a “wait and see”, although I wonder (and this is a theory not a recommendation) whether pruning would give less of a load on damaged roots

Frost last week in the cold snap could be the cause.

Sambucus and cistus are probably both frost damage, and should recover. You could try spraying the other one (on both sides of the leaves) with a fungicide such as Roseclear.