Curling leaves on shrimp plant

[Patty Winter]

Last summer I bought a Monrovia shrimp plant (justicia brandegeana). After a while, its leaves started curling. I found one discussion of the problem online that said it could be a buildup of salts; the plant was in a painted ceramic planter, so I took it out of there, put it back in its original nursery container, and gave it a few deep soakings over a period of weeks. No change. :-(

Here's a photo from someone on a hummingbird forum who had the same problem:

found some other photos of the leaves turning upwards, but mine are curling under just like that one.)

The folks on that forum told her not to worry about it because shrimp plants do that a lot, but it wasn't like that when I bought it, so I don't think it's normal. Any suggestions?

Thanks!

Patty

[Kay Lancaster]

I take it that the leaf is turgid, and not just limp from lack of water.

Patty, turn the leaves over and inspect the underside carefully for signs of infestation. I'm going to guess whitefly or aphics. High N can do it, too, as can some viral infections.

Monrovia is the name of a giant nursery company... not part of the plant's name, fwiw.

Kay

[Patty Winter]

I checked it for bugs when this first happened, but never found anything. I'll get out a magnifying glass, but there's certainly no visible infestation.

I assume that, unlike salts, nitrogen would not be washed away with deep watering, so I would deal with that with the proper food?

?? I didn't say it was part of the name. I was indicating who had bred the plant, in case people wanted to know whether it was from a reputable source.

Patty

[Kay Lancaster]

Grr. Aphids, not aphics.

[Brooklyn1]

Don't be so anal... it couldn't be more obviously a typo... look at your keyboard. DUH

[Kay Lancaster]

Actually, most of the N salts are quite soluble. But without knowledge of your soil analysis and fertilizer use, and how you've treated it since it came from the nursery, I threw that out as a possibility.

Still, you might consider rooting a cutting, growing it in plain sand with a low N fertilizer, and seeing if that straightens new growth.

My misunderstanding. Since the capitalization and spelling of the binomial was wrong, I didn't know if you knew it was a nursery as opposed to part of the common name.

Kay

[Brooklyn1]

Repot into an adequately sized porous (unglazed) clay pot with new high quality potting mix, a mix with no added fertilizer. Place in good light in a warm draught free location. Water regularly, sparingly, do not over water. Over watering and fertilizing are the most common causes of house plant demise. Repot into a clean pot with new potting mix every six months, never fertilize.

[Patty Winter]

Thank you, Kay and "Brooklyn," I'll try your recommendations!

Patty

[RhodeD]

Patty,

I did a little research , mainly just images of the shrimp plant on google, and found that most of the pictures (a good 90%) had the curling leaves. I'm thinking maybe that's why it could have been dubbed the shrimp plant, because of the way the pattern of the leaves are which resembles a curling shrimp's tail......I could be wrong, just a suggestion :)

Duane

[Patty Winter]

:-) I think it's because of the flowers, but yes, the curling does seem to happen a lot. As I mentioned, though, the plant wasn't like that when it came from the nursery, so I think it must be a nutrient problem. Evidently I'm not the only one to screw that up. :-)

Patty

[Lindabubba]

replying to Patty Winter, Lindabubba wrote: Mine is doing the same thing! The leaves were not curled when I bought it last year either. No bugs or signs of bug damage. It?s kept in a pot outside and bloomed profusely. Now starting to go dormant but looks healthy. I will have to check the amount of nitrogen too!

[penmart01]

Here in the US north east it's the time of year when the shrimp plant goes dorment and if the winter is too cold it will die... to survive the winter bring it into a green house or indoors.