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Last spring I purchased a beautiful "everblooming" gardenia grown as a standard. It did bloom all summer on my deck, receiving part sun with shade in the afternoon. I've moved it into my new sunroom where it continues to look great, and is even blooming, with more buds forming. When I bought it, I asked the garden shop owner for his advice on overwintering it in my sunroom, knowing that it was prone to scale, etc. when grown indoors. He gave me what seemed to be the strangest advice. He said, in addition to never letting it dry out, to weekly mist it with straight 70% isopropyl alcohol to kill any pests. I even had him repeat his advice to make sure I heard him correctly.
Well, so far, I've misted it twice since the first appearance of cottony cushion scale on the new growth tips. It hasn't seemed to hurt the gardenia at all, and the soft scale does seem to be knocked out. I was wondering if anybody has ever heard of this preventative treatment or has ever used straight isopropyl alcohol on plants. I could have sworn it was going to kill the plant!
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