A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2005 Potenilla Katherine Dykes

I bought a Potenilla Katherine Dykes from Home Depot about a month ago. Now the leaves and branches seem to be turning brown, especially at the bottom. At the time of purchase, it had yellow flowers and green leaves, now there are 2 dead yellow flowers and it is looking very brown. Is it going to die? If so, I will return it to Home Depot and get my money back. They have a year guarantee for all their plants. It has lots of sun and I water it all the time. I also noticed that it originally was much larger and as I rub off the dead leaves it seems to be shrinking. Any ideas??

i am not actually familiar with that plant, but it sounds like a generic watering problem. one of the things i do is when i don't want the plant i have to make seeds, i remove spent flowers (commonly called "dead heading"). that will give more nourishment to the leaves. also, you may want to check the roots. if they are mushy and black, you may have over watered. that will give the plant an appearance of needing water, but watering will actually make it worse!