Plants and hail damage

MrsJM · Jan 21, 2020 11:53 am

Unfortunately in that crazy Sydney storm last night I wasn’t home to even try to protect some of my plants. The hardest hit (to both the plants and my heart) were my giant elephant ears that were the backdrop to my kitchen splash.

They have been in for about 8 months and had some leaves that were almost 1m long!

The plant seems to have started only sprouting small leaves as of the last month, almost like it knows that’s all it has room for!

I’m wondering first of all whether these plants are too damaged to recover, and secondly whether I should be removing some of the damaged leaves. On one plant literally every leaf is smashed and I’m worried about the plants retaining nutrients and having enough surface area to get sunlight.

Appreciate your help.

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SteveMc · Jan 24, 2020 3:08 pm

Just prune the damaged stalks down to main stalk leaving about 1-2cms space from the 'trunk'. Use a sharp flat blade kitchen knife if the tuber is thick, just to make sure you get a clean cut. Minimise the surface area on the stalk ( cut perpendicular ) as they lose moisture for a while due to the cut.
Dose with seasol and molasses before pruning.

MrsJM · Jan 25, 2020 1:44 pm

SteveMc

Just prune the damaged stalks down to main stalk leaving about 1-2cms space from the 'trunk'. Use a sharp flat blade kitchen knife if the tuber is thick, just to make sure you get a clean cut. Minimise the surface area on the stalk ( cut perpendicular ) as they lose moisture for a while due to the cut.
Dose with seasol and molasses before pruning.

thanks stevemc. Much appreciated. Going to tackle this over the weekend and hopefully there’s enough growing weather left in the season to get some new foliage happening!