Begonia lost to stem rot !

Stem Rot

Here is how I lost my poor Begonia to stem rot.  I only had it for a couple of weeks and here are all of the things I did wrong (in hindsight) which ended up killing the plant.  Here's a post on what to do, if you plant is affected by stem rot. Since this is not the only plant I lost I learnt a couple of things.  Hope this helps.

When I purchased the Begonia I left it outside and I noticed that the soil was constantly dry, I thought this was a good sign, that the plant was in good health so I watered it every other day and left a small container underneath the pot so the access was not removed but eventually absorbed as well.  Big mistake!

The first time I noticed there was something wrong was when the flowers started drooping, as can be seen in the picture above.  I thought that since it was September it was time for them to fall out so it didn't really bother me that much.  Then came the rain.  We had a heavy downpour and that's when I noticed that the soil remained for over a week.  Something was wrong.

I took the plant inside thinking that a few days without watering in a sunny window would do the trick and the soil will dry out.  It didn't.  I moved the leaves about the see what was going on with the stems and an entire stem came off in my hands.  The end of the stem where it broke off was soggy and brown and looked rotten.  That's when I did some research and I found out that stem rot is a disease, a fungus which keeps growing until the plant dies.

The main culprit, over watering with no drainage for access water.... sounds familiar.  Another lesson learnt. 

Update:

In hindsight what I should have done was cut off a stem which wasn't infected and try to propagate the plant.  This is possible by cutting a large enough stem, with possibly some buds in it, at a 45 degree angle and plant it potting soil.  Just enough not to overwhelm the plant.  As you can see above I still have a small part of the plant to the right which is not infected.

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How to Recognise Stem Rot

I decided to write down some notes on stem rot, seeing that I lost 4 plants to this disease.  Whereas in some cases it was my fault due to excessive watering with no drainage among others, I feel I could have saved most of them had I recognised the symptoms earlier.  So here's a small list:

1. Stems begin to lose color - they start going yellowish brown or dark brown just at the base as they are coming out of the soil. 

2. The plant loses it's "vigour", it sort of droops down, slightly at first.  This was one of my mistakes as I thought this was because of underfeeding. Unfortunately, the more water I gave it, the more I aggravated the situation.  Eventually the stems droops down even more until there is nothing left of the plant.

3. Later on in the process as the rotting increases (the dark brown on the stems moves up towards the base of the plant) the plant stops drinking water altogether.  This is the final stage and can take a couple of weeks.  If you notice that the soil remains wet and sort of dries by itself due to evaporation, which is slower, rather than the actual plant feeding you know it's the end.

Stem rot does not affect all stems at once, and it starts at the bottom of the plant.  This means that if you think that the plant has stem rot, stems which are higher up and unaffected (still green and healthy) can be cut and the plant can be propagated anew.  I have never tried this myself because it was always too late, however the plant can be "saved" in this way.

Another way to recognise stem rot in plants with lots of foliage such as my poor portulaca is identifying stems which are drooping down and look unhealthy and giving them a pluck.  Since the base is rotten the stems will come off easily and you can see the brown rot at the base of the stem.

I have also read that the rotting can be cut off from the plant to save it without propagation, again I have never tried this and to be honest I figured that since the rotting emerges from the soil I always thought that the root ball would be severly infected. 

Hope this article helps you to recognise the early signs before it's too late.  This is directly from my limited experience and I am by no means an expert so please take this as a suggestion rather than advice.

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