Practical camellia care from two decades in the garden
Helen Pritchard Helen Pritchard · February 12, 2026
Three years ago, I nearly lost two of my most prized Japonicas. The culprit wasn’t a pest or a late frost. It was my own neglect of something basic: proper mulching. My soil was compacting badly between waterings, the pH…
Helen Pritchard · February 9, 2026
Last spring, I stood in my backyard staring at a row of struggling camellias and felt genuinely baffled. I’ve been growing camellias for over twenty years. My yard in Zone 8b is practically a camellia museum. Yet three of my…
Helen Pritchard · February 7, 2026
Last February, I stood in front of my oldest Kramer’s Supreme’ Japonica and felt genuinely embarrassed. Twenty-three years I have been growing camellias in my Zone 8b garden, and somehow I had let that poor shrub turn into a tangled,…
Helen Pritchard · February 5, 2026
Last spring, I walked out to my back garden and felt my stomach drop. A dozen of my most treasured camellias — plants I had nurtured for over two decades in my Zone 8b garden — were coated in what…
Helen Pritchard · February 2, 2026
I’ve been growing camellias for over twenty years. In that time, I’ve made plenty of mistakes — wrong soil pH, wrong pruning timing, wrong everything. However, nothing frustrated me more than watching my potted camellias slowly decline despite my best…
Helen Pritchard · January 31, 2026
After twenty-plus years of growing camellias in my Zone 7b garden, I thought I had my fertilizing routine figured out. Then came back-to-back seasons of yellowing leaves, sparse blooms, and one particularly sulky Camellia japonica Nuccio’s Gem’ that refused to…
Helen Pritchard · January 28, 2026
Transplanting camellias has always made me nervous. After more than two decades of growing them here in Zone 8b, I’ve learned that even a healthy plant can sulk for a full season after being moved. Last spring, I had to…
Helen Pritchard · January 26, 2026
Last February, I watched helplessly as a hard freeze crept in overnight and torched the open blooms on my Professor Charles S. Sargent’ Japonica. The flowers had been absolutely perfect — deep crimson, fully double, just days from their peak….
Helen Pritchard · January 24, 2026
My camellia hedge has been the pride of my backyard for nearly two decades. However, somewhere around year fifteen, it stopped being manageable and started being a problem. What began as a tidy row of Camellia japonica Kramer’s Supreme’ had…
Helen Pritchard · January 21, 2026
Last November, I walked out to check on my camellias and noticed something that made my stomach drop. A white, waxy crust had built up along the stems of my oldest Japonica — Kramer’s Supreme,’ a plant I’ve been nurturing…