Lavatera - is it dead?

[MrsDinky]

Hi, haven't posted in Gardening before, (not sure why as I love gardening), wondering if anyone can help.

Was wondering if my lavatera has fallen victim to the harsh winter, we lost quite a lot of plants, it has not sprouted any new growth yet but can't remember when it normally starts. Has anyone else noticed theirs starting to grow yet? Got my fingers crossed because it was a fabulous purple colour rather than the normal pink and not sure where I could get a replacement.

Things are coming through very late this year. Lavatera is pretty difficult to kill off so I would hang on and it may start sprouting in a couple of weeks. Fingers crossed!

Mine has a few new leaves but no shoots from the bottom yet.

Agree that everything is really late starting this year, even down here in the SW.

Are you North?

No, South central, but it is in the shade, so maybe I will just have to wait a bit longer and see, I am not very good at that! My favourite hardy fuchsia has just started sprouting after me hovering anxiously over it for the last couple of weeks.

I did manage to somehow kill off my previous lavatera, will definitely be piling mulch around more plant bases next winter, I only did it to a few odd ones with fallen leaves this year and lo and behold the ones that were covered have been the survivors.

Some of the hebes (the larger leaved ones) are looking completely buggered.

I have lost a very old flowering currant, a blueberry bush and my very large rosemary bush got a lot of the big woody branches broken off by snow, it looked a right mess till I cut it all back last week.

My rosemary bush died a few years ago. I plunged a few of the remaining small branches into the ground and they are all doing really well now.

Have you cut into a branch to see if it's green?

The lavatera? It has just got hollow dead stems growing from the ground, I'll have a closer look tomorrow and see if there is any solid wood at the base. I'm probably just going to have to be patient aren't I?

My hardy fuchsia still looks dead

My purple Lavatera is looking very dormant too but there was some green when I scraped a bit of bark.
Quite a few things seem to be taking a while to get going this spring although I haven't given up all hope yet.
However my (previously) beautiful Callistemon is dried up and definitely dead

Not much kills off a lavatera. Best wait and see - it could just be a slow starter this year. Mine is, perhaps because the earlier mildness of the winter cuased it to start growing in December.

i had to cut most of the lavatera back to the tiny green shotots at the base. The branches had actually turned black. I think the snow got to it.

Lost a large rosemary, a beautiful cistus and other shrubs.

I scraped the surface of the wooden stump of the lavatera and it was green, so fingers crossed. My buddleia is sprouting, but definitely later than usual, don't mind too much because it gets huge and takes over half the garden every year.

I think my rosemary is still OK, but I have had to reduce it in size by about 2/3, which is drastic but at least has given me back about a metre of ground either side of it.