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Peony White Powder on Leaves: Causes & How to Fix It

A dusting of white powder on the leaves of your peony, cottony white clumps, or pale scratched patches. Whether it rubs off, whether it is on the top or underside, and whether it is powdery or fluffy tells you what you are dealing with.

Check these first

  • Does it rub off with a finger? Powder that rubs off is a fungus; marks that stay are scarring from pests.
  • Is it on the upper or lower leaf surface, or concentrated on new shoots and leaf joints?
  • If it is cottony, look inside the fluff for insects.

Most likely causes

From the pests and diseases recorded for this plant, the ones whose symptoms match, most serious first. Symptoms alone rarely confirm a cause, so use the linked page to check the signs and treatment.

Powdery Mildew

White patches appear scattered on the upper leaf surface at first, then the whole leaf is coated in a white powder. Leaves later yellow, brown and die back, and reduced photosynthesis cuts growth and yield.

General description; not specific to this plant.

How to identify and treat: Powdery Mildew

Sclerotinia Rot

The crown, stem or head rots in a water-soaked way and is covered in white cottony mycelium. Black sclerotia later form inside and on the surface, and the plant wilts and dies.

General description; not specific to this plant.

How to identify and treat: Sclerotinia Rot

Rust

Small raised orange-yellow to red-brown pustules form on both leaf surfaces, then rupture and release powdery spores. Heavy infection yellows the leaves and kills them early.

General description; not specific to this plant.

How to identify and treat: Rust

Other possible causes

The three above are the causes on record for this symptom.

Other symptoms on this plant

What other growers did about it

A page like this one can tell you what peony white powder on leaves is and what to try. What it cannot tell you is what actually happened to someone who had it on the same plant, at the same point in the season, and what they did next.

Gadenin is a free garden journal built around that. You photograph the plant, tag what you are seeing, and the entries line up by date for each plant you grow.

  • Tag the problem and the app tells you how many other growers have logged the same thing on the same plant.
  • Growers who make their records public can be followed, so you can read what they did and how it turned out.
  • Next season your own entries come back at the same point in the year, so you check the plant before it starts.

Free on iPhone. Recording, tagging and reading public records cost nothing.

Read next

Photograph the same leaf every few days. Powdery mildew spreads leaf by leaf, so the photos show whether your treatment stopped it.

See what other growers did about it

Log it in the free Gadenin app and tag what you are seeing. Your photos line up by date so you can tell whether it is spreading, and you can see how many other growers have logged the same problem on the same plant, follow them and read what they did next.

Free on iPhone. Android coming later.

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