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As a part of the mint family, this sage is a perennial plant that is greyish-green in colour, has purple flowers, and is an evergreen shrub. This aromatic plant is used for cooking and also in making tea.
If you are growing sage plants in your home or garden and you notice that they are turning yellow, what could be the possible reasons. The following article below will discuss possible reasons why your sage is turning yellow and how we can solve the issues.
Why Is My Sage Turning Yellow?
Your sage plant is turning yellow due to some factors, a few have been listed below as possible reasons:
- Underwatering
- Pest and Damaging diseases
- Lack of nitrogen, essential nutrients
- Overwatering and slow soil drainage.
- Lack of sunlight.
Yellowing Of Leaves Caused By Under watering
Sage plants are recognized as drought-resistant, hence underwatering is not a common problem. However, circumstances in which the sage plant that’s planted in a pot is kept indoors, away from sunlight, and overlooked for weeks. The underwatered sage plant will start having a yellow and pale appearance.
How To Solve Yellowing Caused By UnderWatering
If the sage plants are indoors, frequent watering especially during summer, fall and spring will prevent the soil from drying out and the plants from turning yellow, within a week or two the sage plants will begin to recover fully.
Place the sage plant under the plant once they have been watered fully to allow the sun to absorb excess moisture.
Yellowing Caused By Pests And Diseases
Sage plants are not generally attacked by pests, but certain destructive pests can attack sage plants. Pests like aphids and thrips feed on the moisture content from the leaves of sage plants.
Aphids are small ants with soft bodies that attack plants by sucking out fluids from the plant leaves with their mouth. If these pests are large in numbers, they can damage the structure of the leaves causing the leaves to turn yellow or have discolored patches
Another factor affecting sage plants is diseases. Diseases such as mint rusts, mildew, and leaf spot.
Leaf spot is caused by strains of fungal and has an appearance of yellow blotches on the leaves of sage plants.
Mint rust may cause small, yellow, or bright patches on the underside of leaves, new leaves will be pale and fall off from plants.
Powdery mildew shows up as white spores on the leaves of sage plants.
How To Solve It
- Make use of plants that are free from disease when planting sage.
- Ensure a well-draining soil is used.
- Avoid inflicting marks and injuries on the plants.
- Remove infected parts to avoid spreading to other parts of the plants.
- Heat treatments should be carried out on the infected roots.
Yellowing Caused By Lack Of Nitrogen, Essential Nutrients
Although sage plants prefer medium-nutrient soil, it also requires some nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium to thrive. Nutrient deficiencies occur when the plant roots keep absorbing nutrients like iron and nitrogen that are present in the soil. Lack of nitrogen will result in leaves turning yellow.
How To Solve The Problem
- Ensure the sage plant is located in soil that has proper drainage.
- A soil test should be carried out to determine what nutrients are deficient in the soil.
- When applying fertilizer, use a slow-releasing type that contains only the necessary nutrients the plant requires.
Over Watering And Slow Draining Soil
Since sage is a drought-resistant herb, it needs well-draining soil to thrive, so if the soil is constantly moist, the sage will turn yellow as the roots are constantly stressed out. Overwatering Sage plants will cause them to wilt and suffer when there is constant moisture in the soil.
Sage grows in stony soils and grit so. therefore they are adapted to the soil that barely retains moisture. Slow draining soil such as rich compost, clay, and boggy soils are the exact opposite of sage preferred growing soil.
How To Solve Over Watering And Slow Draining soil
Sage thrives extremely well in pots due to their favourable drainage and it makes it very easy to control the soil form. If your garden soil has slow draining it would be better to plant the sage plants in planting in pots to keep the plant healthy and the leaves fresh.
Cut down on the watering so that the soil has an opportunity to dry out between rainfall or extra watering as sage is native to dry Mediterranean conditions so can be vulnerable to overwatering.
How To Cure Yellowing Plants
When plants are not able to take up essential nutrients, this can result in the yellowing of plants. To prevent the yellowing of plants, it is best to use porous well-draining soil, if your plants turn yellow because of overwatering, the plant should be placed outside to reduce the moisture content in it.
How Often Should I Water My Sage?
As we have discussed above, sage is native to the Mediterranean and is adapted to sandy soils and drought areas. You should water your sage plant when you notice that your plant looks underwatered and dehydrated.
How Do You Care For Sage Plants Indoors?
- Feed your sage plant with the necessary nutrient they need to thrive, some of those nutrients include; nitrogen, iron, potassium, phosphorous.
- Ensure that your potted plant has a good drainage system to avoid root rot and the plant should be placed close to the window where sunlight can access it.
- Make sure your plant looks dry before watering vigorously.
Finally, we have been able to address various reasons as to why your sage plant is turning yellow and how to solve these problems, if you can identify your plant issue and love it by following the steps above, your sage plant will continue to thrive properly.
