Seeking wisdom re culture of purshia/cliffrose

[luvinthemountains]

Who on the forum has experience growing cliffrose in containers? I have one that I collected from deep sand in southern Utah that has been chilling in a 5gal nursery can since spring 2021, in a mix of pumice and lava. With such an open mix, I was watering daily last summer. This spring, for simplicity, I have been fertilizing everything on the same rotating schedule: week 1 kelp, week 2 fish, week 3 @Leo in N E Illinois's K-lite MSU chemical fert. The tree is nice and green, with the exception of one major branch (essentially 1/3 the foliage mass) that started yellowing about a month ago and has not recovered yet. I am hoping that it is just preparing to grow a new crop of leaves similar to what my mountain mahogany did. The other thing I have noticed is that the growth is extremely slow! But all of this could be owing to my unwitting mistakes, so I am hoping that someone here has the scoop on what it takes to keep purshia healthy.

I will post a photo for reference, but I am really looking for general tips on the species in containers, not necessarily input on my specific one.

 

[luvinthemountains]

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

wow, that's a new one for me. Its not often I have to look up a genus name because I know nothing about it. Glad my K-Lite fertilizer is working well on it. Thank you for trying it out, glad you like it for your trees in general.

Going out on a limb, I would guess that the same pattern of water and drought that keeps your mountain mahogany happy would work with the Purshia. But I am merely guessing. If it comes from lower elevations I would worry about keeping it too wet. But I am just guessing.

Keep us posted.

Great thing about desert trees, are small leaves, interesting bark and in this case, nice white flowers. This has some potential.