My June Hosta looks sick!

AliceS · Post by **AliceS** » Jul 11, 2006 8:44 pm

I purchased June in August of 2004 from a local Hosta specialty nursery - very good reputation.

It grew well in 2004, and did well in 2005 also, this year it came up looking nice and healthy with good growth - then about 2 weeks ago (very suddenly) it statred showing spots on the leaves, it looks almost like oil spots. It isn't the classic ink bleed that indicates HVX.

Even new emerging leaves have the oily looking spots as soon as the leaves unfurl, and the older leaves down at the base of the plant are getting very crinkly looking, not smooth like most June Hosta I have seen.

I have no other Hosta in my collection (under 200) that show any signs of HVX or any other disease. I haven't bought anything from Big Box stores, only from a few local suppliers and some online from reputable sources. I started cleaning my tools with alchohol a couple years ago when the epidemic became known.

Could you take a look at the attached pictures and let me know your opinion?

AliceS · Post by **AliceS** » Jul 11, 2006 8:48 pm

Here is the entire plant on 6-28-06. It has a little rain water on the front leaves, but you can see the oily looking splotches on the back leaves.

AliceS · Post by **AliceS** » Jul 11, 2006 8:50 pm

Here is a closeup of a leaf, a newer one that doean't have the bumps yet. You can see the oily looking spots on this one pretty good.

Post by **Chris_W** » Jul 11, 2006 9:28 pm

Hi Alice,

Your June looks very healthy to me. The oily spots are probably just some of the waxy coating melting or washing off. The blue in hostas is a wax and when it warms up it melts off. Might also be tree sap or even dust or pollution collecting. Whatever it is it is just surface damage and not disease.

The bumping of the oldest set of leaves is from cold damage. The eye was probably just forming or emerging last spring and then was exposed to a cold spell. This can cause the outer set of leaves to tighten a bit, and when they come up they get some crinkling. This type and appearance of bumping is also not what you would see in HVX. The distortion of tissue from HVX occurs somewhat randomly along the leaves, tends to follow in the direction of the veins, and can bump out above and also sink in below the leaf surface. It almost looks like scar tissue from a nasty cut that didn't heal right.

So I'm sure you will be relieved to know that this hosta looks perfectly fine, and to your credit it is a beautiful looking plant

AliceS · Post by **AliceS** » Jul 12, 2006 8:51 pm

Thank you so much, Chris! That is great news, I'm so relieved that June doesn't have HVX. Thanks again.