There were so many of you! Why were you so greedy? I love my Genista plant and it had lost all the leaves because of you, greedy caterpillars. I know that you will grow into pretty little moths. I love butterflies and moths…. I love to see them flying around in my garden. But once again, you were too greedy, very destructive little creatures. I had no choice but to kill you. If it was only a few of you, I would have never noticed you at all and your chance to live would be much greater.
Here I am lamenting and finding reasons for killing those tiny caterpillars, ha, ha! Anyway, I am happy now that after we had few autumn rains lately, our G. racemosa has started to look quite green again with new foliage.
I’m not sure what those caterpillars are called. I think they are some type of Genista caterpillar and the species that is commonly found attacking Cytisus plants in Australia is Uresiphita ornithopteralis or with the common name tree lucerne caterpillar/moth.
Nov 03, 2010 @ 05:25:30
How did you end up killing the little buggers? I have just found them all over my lovely broom. Last year they stripped it and i don’t want them doing that again.
Nov 03, 2010 @ 07:03:34
I sprayed them with Pyrethrum Insecticide and straight away they wriggled, dropped and died. After that I regularly repeat the spray, hopefully they will never come back again.
Oh yes, I bought the Pyrethrum in concentrated form (Yates) and mix it with water. I found that it is cheaper than buying ready use.
Thanks for the comment and good luck!
Genista racemosa « Kiyanti2008′s Weblog
Jan 19, 2011 @ 04:13:47
Mar 30, 2011 @ 04:15:27
Hi,
I live in Texas in the US, in zone 8-9. This is the first time I have seen the Broom (specifically the Genista Racemosa) at our nursery. I’ve seen things like it, but nothing that claims to reach 6X6 feet. Wow. I will get in the ground tomorrow, but as your blog is one of the few webspots where I can see and read about this specific Broom, I wondered if you could answer a few questions. I know it begins blooming in the spring, but the tag on the plant says it blooms all summer. Can you tell me your experience. Our summers here are very long. And HOW did you get this many limbed thing (a bush right now about 12 inches high in a 2 gallon pot) to be such a wonderful topiary? Yours is beautiful.
Thank you for any help.
Sincerely,
Sheila
Mar 30, 2011 @ 10:16:29
September to November is spring time here in Australia. Our Genista starts to have flower buds around August and the buds will start to open in September. In October the flowers almost cover the whole plant and they will start to grow into small pods in December (which is the start of Summer).
During the summer it will flower a little bit only few here and there. The real floral display is in spring. If your spring is too cold over there, perhaps it will flower in summer instead …. just guessing:)
I think your plant is still very young. Leave it in the pot or plant it in the garden, but don’t prune it yet. When the plant has grown about 2 ft tall, you can start to shape it by cutting off bottom branches to expose the main trunk (I start cutting from the bottom up). After half the way up is bare, you can shape the top part/canopy by cutting the tips of the branches so it will look kind of round (or any other desired shape).
When the canopy starts to grow out of shape, it must be pruned to maintain its shape. Also any new growth that start to grow on the bare trunk have to be cut.
The older the plant the better the shape:) Well, I hope it will help you. Good luck with your plant.
PS. If your plant has multiple trunks and it is not possible to make topiary, it will also nice to prune it into round like a ball.
Jun 04, 2011 @ 23:22:23
I recently bought these and I live in zone 9. We have clay soil, and both of my 2 gal’s died. Now, I got much larger ones. I am determined to have these in my garden! What do you recommend?
Thanks for your input in advance!
Jun 05, 2011 @ 01:45:40
Hi Jenny, I think your soil is the problem. Genista needs to grow in “well drain soil”. You will need to improve your soil condition by adding a lot of compost and sand. Or maybe you can ask your local nursery how to deal with the condition.
Thank you and good luck!