The exotic window leaf impresses with its monumental beauty and undemanding care. Regardless of this, symptoms of disease suddenly appear on Monstera species, such as yellow leaves or brown spots. You can find out here what exactly these harmful images can be attributed to and how the problem can be solved.
What diseases can occur with Monstera?
Monstera plants may show disease symptoms such as yellow leaves or brown spots due to care errors. Possible causes include nutrient deficiency, drought stress, waterlogging or leaf chlorosis. Fungal infections such as eyespot can also occur and must be controlled with fungicides.
Care errors cause symptoms of illness
There are no pathogens that are causing problems for your window leaf. This applies at least to yellow leaves, because this damage results from neglect in care. We have put together the most common causes of the problem with tips for solving them here:
- Nutrient deficiency: From now on, fertilize liquidly every 2 weeks in summer and every 6 weeks in winter
- Drought stress: Dip the root ball once in water, then keep the substrate constantly slightly moist
- Waterlogging: Repot the window leaf as soon as possible and water more moderately
- Leaf chlorosis: From now on, water and spray with lime-free water
If light brown to yellowish spots with a dark area spread on the leaves, it is often assumed that there is a fungal infection. As a rule, the window leaf is sunburned if the location suddenly comes into direct sunlight. Since monsteras don't like changing locations, a curtain or awning should filter the sunlight.
Brown spots and brown leaves are alarm signals
If brown spots with a light halo appear on your window leaf, which spread and cover the entire leaf, you are often dealing with eyespot disease. This is caused by the fungal pathogen Spilocaea oleagina. Please cut off all infected leaves immediately and dispose of them in the trash can.
If the disease is not contained after this measure, treat it with a fungicide. Copper-based control agents, such as Atempo fungus-free, have proven to be effective in practice. So that the window leaf can better defend itself against the pathogens, strengthen the immune system with liverwort extract or horsetail decoction.
Tip
Although diseases usually avoid the window leaf, this does not apply to pests. Especially during the winter, spider mites, scale insects, mealybugs and mealybugs set their sights on the mighty leaves when there is dry heating air at the location. An effective prevention against the pests is to regularly spray the top and bottom surfaces with soft water.
