What is eating my bougainvillea?
- Thread starter pascaleks
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Greetings, welcome to the Forums.
Tell us more about what care and conditions the plant receives. Also, besides the necrotic areas, there also looks to be a white residue on the leaves. Do you know what that might be? Was the plant sprayed with anything?
Tell us more about what care and conditions the plant receives. Also, besides the necrotic areas, there also looks to be a white residue on the leaves. Do you know what that might be? Was the plant sprayed with anything?
Hey Marck thanks for yourreply! The plant is doing great, full of flowers etc just from time to time the leaves seem to be under heavy attack like they are now in the photo I sent, so I think the exposure to the sun, light and water are good. I give the plant from time to time vitamins etc but nothihg else. I did treat it once with a natural insecticide (Mr Ganick) that worked wonderfully but the same product now is not working anymore.. I did spray the plant with some water and a bit of leaf nourishing spray, the white is probably just the dust as we are in the UAE and it is quite dusty here 
I'm not certain what is causing this. Random necrotic patches could be due to incidental sun or wind scorch or heat stress, but there are some fungal diseases that can sometimes cause symptoms like this. The pattern on the leaves looks different than what is typical for Bougainvillea Leaf-spot (Passalora bougainvilleae), so I don't think it is that. Overall your culture of the plant sounds fine. I'm not familiar with Mr. Ganick, but there are organic fungal sprays with copper or sulfur that can sometimes be effective, if this is a disease. If the damage is just occasional, try removing the damaged leaves and disposing of them away form the plant. This could reduce the availability of spores. and will certianly keep the plant looking better.
I was planning on cutting off all damaged leaves and see. I have another bougainvillea 2 feet away from this one that has none of the symptoms so I'm ruling out climate and heat stress, specialy that this plant is all over the place around us and doing just fine. I'll remove the damaged leaves and spray again and see. Cant thank you enough for your time Marck
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Is it in a windier location than your other ones? It looks more like it's been beaten-up than eaten or diseased.
Both bougainvillea are located next to each other, one with the problem and the other nothing. I just trimmed all the damaged leaves and used neem oil. Do you know if neem oil can be used in the watering too or only as spray on the leaves like they say on the bottle that I bought..?
There are recipes for neem oil soil drenches, usually 1 tablespoon to a gallon of water, or similar. I doubt that would have much effect on such foliar leaf spots. Still, if you do give it a try, let us know how it goes.
Hey looks kinda like mealybug pest damage but also looks like the plant is stressed from lack of water, lack of nutrients or heat stress
I dont think it's heat, water or nutrients as it's right next to another the same which has no issue at all.. But thanks for the mealybug pest hint, I will look it up! Thanks for your time!
The reason i think it could be mealybugs is because of the white residue on the leaves which doesn't look like powdery mildew.
Thank you!
It's been awhile since this your thread was posted. Did you ever get a definitive answer on what was/is causing the issue?