My Gardening Tale of Woe . . .

11 years ago

We have a beautiful butterfly bush--"Black Knight"--just off our deck. Something had been eating the leaves, so DH and I decided to get some insecticide soap to spray on them. We did it a week ago, and it seemed to be helping. The instructions said not to spray more often than every 7 days. Yesterday was a week and the day was good- cloudy with no breeze. The bush is already 6' tall, filled with beautiful purple/black blooms. Since DH is unsteady on uneven ground, he sprayed the front side from the walkway and I did the back side. Boy, did I do a good job! I sprayed those leaves top and bottom to make sure I hit all the bugs which might have been hiding.

After lunch, I took Maggie (cat) out for a few minutes. I noticed the butterfly bush looked rather peaked. The sun was breaking thru the clouds, and I thought maybe it was too hot for the leaves with the insecticide soap spray on them. When I looked more closely, I saw that the bush was is great distress. To make this long story shorter--we had used weed killer! Same type of plastic bottle, almost same color. Neither DH nor I read the name. We immediately began to hose it down, but we're pretty sure the damage had already been done. Needless to say, that poor bush will be removed, shortly.

We also learned that we need to store things like week killer far away from other garden stuff. We learned the hard way, but I'm pretty sure we did learn! :>(

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Comments (7)

lindac
11 years ago
Doctors and nurses make it a rule to read the bottle 3 times before injecting something.
I also have learned the hard way....but not with anything so important as a butterfly bush just off my deck. It was a patch of grass waaaaay down back!
But I know read the label 3 times before I spray or sprinkle,
gabriell_gw
11 years ago
Sorry to hear what happened to the Butterfly Bush. They are so beautiful.
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mawheel
Original Author
11 years ago
H-m-m-m, "Read the label three times before you spray or sprinkle." That's a good thing to remember, too.
anneliese_32
11 years ago
I am so sorry about your butterfly bush. Lost a "Black Knight" 7 yr old bush a couple of years ago and never found out from what it died.
Now I am going to seperate my sprays and sprinklies too before I treat the eggplants, which have tiny holes all over the leaves.
rhizo_1 (North AL) zone 7
11 years ago
Hi y 'all. I've taught pest management for many years in training programs for landscaping professionals. I drilled into their heads that labels shoud be read before you buy it, before you mix it and apply it, before you store ir or dispose of the container. EVERY time. That should apply to homeowners and the ready-to-use products that they buy, too.

Dorie
west_gardener
11 years ago
How about the person who has a very long history of not reading lables or reading instructions for that matter. I don't understand that mindset but that's the way it has been for over 50 years.
I'm the read the lable/instructions cop.

Any help?
tkhooper
11 years ago
i'm so sorry you lost the butterfly bush. it sounds like it was a beauty.