Practical camellia care from two decades in the garden
Helen Pritchard · September 1, 2026
Last spring, a friend called in a panic. Her prized Camellia japonica ‘Elegans’ was yellowing, dropping buds, and looking genuinely unwell. Before I could ask a single diagnostic question, she’d already dissolved an aspirin tablet in water and was reaching for a bucket of fresh cow manure from a neighboring farm. “The internet says both … Read more
Helen Pritchard · September 1, 2026
Last spring, I was deadheading spent blooms on my ‘Elegans’ camellia when I noticed something odd: tiny, perfect semicircles nibbled out of the leaf margins, like someone had used pinking shears on every other leaf. My first thought was thrips. My second was scale. Neither was right. What I was actually looking at—and what I’d … Read more
Helen Pritchard · September 1, 2026
I keep a small notebook where I record the annual growth of each camellia in my garden. After twenty years and more than 200 named cultivars across three USDA zones, I’ve learned something that most published camellia growth charts won’t tell you: the same cultivar can grow twice as fast—or half as fast—depending on three … Read more
Helen Pritchard · September 1, 2026
It was August, fifteen years into my camellia obsession, when I learned the cruelest lesson about drought. A bed of established plants—including a magnificent ‘Debutante’ that had been in the ground for eight years—looked utterly fine. The foliage was glossy. No wilting. No crispy edges. So when a particularly hot, dry spell swept through zone … Read more
Helen Pritchard · September 1, 2026
I garden in the American South—USDA zones 7b, 8a, and 8b—where I keep over two hundred named camellia cultivars. I do not garden in the UK. However, I have toured gardens in Cornwall, the Cotswolds, and Surrey, and I correspond regularly with British growers who have taught me that growing camellias in the UK is … Read more