Brugmansia care
Brugmansia, Angel Trumpet is a large shrub or small tree with large, pendent trumpet shaped flowers. There are several varieties that range in color and growth habit but all are known for their exotic fragrance which intensifies in the evening. They are frost tender (zone 8 ) and prefer a warm to hot climate in protected sun.
Care
Plant in a light, fertile, well- drained soil. Brugmansia is a fast grower and heavy feeder and needs to be fertilized regularly ( 2x per week) during the growing season. Provide lots of water to keep it in bloom all summer and fall. Since it blooms on new wood, it can be trimmed when growth becomes excessive or when you want to shape it as a dense round shrub or tree . It will take a month or more to resume blooming after pruning.

Winterover brugmansia
In cold climates, it is best to grow it in a container and move it indoors/greenhouse to a frost-free area during the winter. Place it in a south window and maintain it as a houseplant during this time watering once a week. You may get some leaf drop which is normal. The second option is to cut your brugmansia back and store it dormant in a cool (above 40F), dark place (basement, garage) watering monthly to keep the soil from totally drying out. The plant will defoliate completely during dormancy.
Prune it in the spring after the last frost, when new growth appears and the plant is ready to go outside; cut back to one or two buds.
No flowers can be the result of low light, low fertilizer or excessive heat.
All parts of this plant are poisonous and not advisable to grow if you have small children or animals that eat plants.
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Winterover brugmansia
I live in NC and have a Yellow Angel’s Trumpet planted in a med. size barrel.
What do I do with this plant for the winter? Should I bring it in, cover it, cut it ( How Much ). I need help. Thanks.
Yellow lower leaves
My trumpet plants are turning yellow on the bottom leaves, I have not fertilized with anything this season, what should I use to fertilize with and do I need to trim off the yellow leaves, they are also six foot tall and have beautiful blooms now.
Leaf drop
I have 2 large angel trumpet plants that are about 4 ft tall, my problem is.. the leaves on the plants reach full size and fall off… they regrow. but fall again…leaving just the large stem… what can I do to keep the leaves from falling. They are in containers that are to large to be moved … Please advise help for them
Thanks, Betty — Edwardsville, Pa.
Wintering datura
Could you tell me about the care and wintering of datura Lilly ? This is my first one.. thanks I enjoy this site very much
Not blooming
I live in lower north Alabama and have 3 angel trumpets. So far none of them have shown any signs of blooming. What do I need to do?
Not blooming
I live in Central Ohio and have my angel trumpet planted for 3 years now but I have yet to see it bloom or any sign of blooms. It has grown very tall; in fact it now reaches the roof of my house but still shows no signs of blooming. I have a tremendous amount of new growth this year. What am I doing worng?
When to harvest seed pods?
Propagate from cuttings
How do you take stem cuttings from the Brugs, and which part of the plant is best to use?
yellow leaf drop
I live in Las Vegas, NV, the weather since I bought my brug maybe three weeks ago has been between 75-90 during the day, and 65-75 during the night. I have watered it every day, it has never dried out. It was blooming when I bought it and now after a couple of weeks without is starting to bloom heavily again, but leaves all over the plant are turning yellow and dying now, for about a week and a half. It had a fairly heavy aphid and mite problem, which I subdued with insecticidal soap last week. Could the insecticidal soap have caused the leaf die off? I know from reading others posts on leaf yellowing that there are many possible causes. There is one other thing, my 3-4 foot brug has a new tree sprouting up from the roots, about 2 inches from the trunk, I have let it grow thus far, not knowing if I should or not. Could this new baby brug be sapping the big one’s energy and causing the leaf die off? Should I eliminate it? Or is there a way to remove it and replant it? Many questions, I know, thank you for any help you can give me.
Wintering brugmansia
hello, i have recieved 3 plants from my mother, i live on the east coast of canada,can someone tell me what i should do in fall, i have a greenhouse but it is not heated, do they come in the house for the winter? i am in zone 3 in canada
HI I LIVE IN TORONTO , CANADA, I HAVE TWO BRUGMANSIA, YELLOW NAD PEACH, WHAT CAN I DO IN MY CLIMATE, IT IS GETTING COLD HERE, I BROUGHT THEM INSIDE BUT THE LEAVES ARE DYING.
TANYA
This will be the second winter our brugmansia has endured in zone 6. We were told by the seller last fall to cut it back to a “stump” about two feet tall and keep it watered in the garage. This past spring it sprouted and grew but it was a completely new sprout, not from the old wood. It seemed to do OK this summer, but I’m wondering if I should a) do the same this winter, b) cut it back even shorter since it seemed to do OK, or c) leave more as your article seems to suggest.
Poisonous
Angel Trumpet: How careful do I need to be handling an Angel Trumpet Tree? My husband wants me to get rid of it because its poisonous! If we brush against it or use our hands to pick up it’s leaves could we become sick?? I have spent 5 hours researching internet looking for some answers. Any help/advice is greatly appreciated. Marilou
I got my yellow brugmansia a year ago and it grew well inside the house in a pot. It bloomed in December 2006 and then in late January 07 it started to get many yellow leaves and almost all have dropped off leaving a few at the top which are half green. It had been by a south window so moved it to an east window in case the sun had been too hot. We are at 8400 ft altitude. I have watered, used Miracle Gro and don’t know anything else to do. Should it be repotted, pruned back, or ???? Help.
back
Root pruning
I live in Southern Spain and grow pink, lemon and white Brugmansia. It is very hot in summer, sometimes above 40 degrees but cold in winter, down to minus 12. I grow all my plants in pots. You mention root pruning which I would like to try as they are too big now to move. What time of year should I do this and how?
Wintering brugmansia
I live in zone 7B and have had brugmansias in the ground all winter for about 5 years. Someone at the nursery said do not cut the stalks off during the winter so I wait until spring when I see new growth coming from the ground to cut the old stalk off. It is so ugly all winter that I am wondering why it is necessary to leave it. Is it really necessary?
Wintering brugmansia
I have a Brugmansia plant in my back garden and need to know what to do with it in the winter. It is planted in the ground so i can not bring it indoors, what do i need to do to keep it safe for the winter?
Brugmansia My 2 year old brug is producing lots of buds and last week it produced a beautiful big flower. The flower is already dead. It started getting brown around the tips of the bloom then it moved further up till it fell off. Last year I had one flower all season and the same exact thing happened. I water 3 times a week in california (70 degrees recently). What can I do to save the rest of my beautiful buds? Advice please!!
I pulled an overturned potted brugmansia up from under a pile of the neighbor’s brush. After retrieving it, I realized that the long tap root had grown out of the pot’s drain hole and is now exposed.
Can I cut this root or do I need to do something else to save the plant?
Thanks
In my earlier post I forgot to mention that the tap root wasn’t just growing out of the drain hole, it had apparently begun growing in the soil. In freeing the pot from the brush, I assumed that the tugging required to lift the pot was because of the brush, otherwise, I would have taken better precautions.
What are my chances of saving this plant?
Thanks so much for the advice on cutting the taproot then babying the plant for several weeks. It actually looks quite good and healthy now, even with that taproot exposed (about 10 inches). I need to be gone for the month of July and somebody will be watering my yard, so I doubt there’ll be much “babying.” That being the case, I think I’ll wait until I get back to do my taproot surgery. Thanks again for your response.
Are you in an area where you can plant it in the ground? If so you may not need to cut the taproot.
I have 3 brugmansia - how do you pronounce the name? I live in Minnesota, so they are brought inside in the fall. All have bloomed and all have many buds on them now, but the leaves have yellowed & many are curled up, which has never happened before. It has been quite chilly for several nights. Could this cause the leaf curl?
Hello! I have a peach coloured Brugmansia that I bought this spring 08 as a freshly sprouted cutting. It has been growing happily outside all summer long. I did not fertilize it, but it was still doing great untill a few weeks ago when some leaves started to slowly turn yellow. I also just inspected it and found aphids and whiteflies, which I promptly took care of. Now I realize that I should have been fertilizing it, but at the same time I have heard that it shouldn’t be fertilized in fall/winter when I take it inside. Should I feed it now or not? Also, I was wondering when I should repot it. My Brugmansia is only about a foot tall (though it is of a miniature variety that grows to four feet max) and in a two gallon pot. Thank you!
I purchased my first three Angel Trumpets this past summer (white, pink & purple) so I guess you could consider mine “babies�; their no more than 2ft. high including their pots. Just recently I’ve noticed that every several days a leaf (yes one leaf) will yellow and fall off within three to four days time. They are potted in miracle grow and are watered every couple of days. Also, I’ve done my research and have found that I have small colonies of white flies. I first treated my plants with a light spraying of Bayer rose and plant insect killer and three days later the white flies were back and more numerous. What can I do about the occasionally yellow leaf and the while flies? Anything else you can tell would be help too. These are my first Angel Trumpets.
Thank you!
Wintering brugmansia
I have a nicely growing Brugmansia in a container outdoors in Southern California. I am wondering what its winter care should be in the Southern California climate.
My Brugmansia is inside in the Northeast in a south facing window. The leaves are becoming mottled and some are falling off. where the leaves meet the stems I see sticky drippy looking substance and at the nmodes there is weblike substance, tho I cannot see any spider mites or other. Please help! Thank you
Hi,
I have a brugmansia in Zone 11 (Vieques, PR). He is so sad. There was very little new growth from September to December so I repotted him again. He seems a little happier and is starting to put out new leaves. Someone here told me that my Brug will not do well in a zone 11 as there is not enough of a temperature differencial. Is that true? He is watered at least twice a week and gets a weekly dose of fertilizer. I had such great success with brugmansias in NC and I cannot figure out what is wrong.
I FELL IN LOVE WITH THE BRUGMANSIA PLANT. I BUY SOME ROOTS FEW DAYS AGO BUT I DONT KNOW WHAT TO DO. SHOULD I POT IT WITH SOIL OR USE JUST WATER? I DONT KNOW PLEASE HELP
Plant the roots in some good potting mix that drains well and water.
ok i am ganna be recieving brugmansia in about 2-4 days. i know that native american shamans as well as all other religions in the world has partaked in this psychotropic plant. i’ve read up on Datura inoxia tried to propagate from seed didnt work. so then i wanted a live plant. so i ordered it(not before researching) and i know that the toxins varies from plant to plant climate to climate. but would i go and do somthing wrong by eating 2 leaves????
I live in SE corner of UK. I have a number of Brugmansia and one Datura growing in pots in a sunny rear garden. They are doing well with huge green leaves, however something is taking large bites out of the leaves. I can see no evidence of snail trails nor any sign of caterpillars. What is the range of munchers that eat these plants in UK? P.S. in the interim, I’ve just sprayed plants with a systemic insecticide.
Yours sincerely Mike Foster
A systemic insecticide will take care of many insects.
I have a 3 year old brugmansia and apparently I was unaware that the drain hole was blocked and caused all of the leaves to drop off. I’m not sure how long it sat in the water but at least 5/7 days. What would be the best way to try and revive this plant, or can it be saved? It produced over 80 flowers this spring so you can see this is a pretty good size potted plant. Your help would be appreciated. Thank you, Russ
Hi, all good tips above. Thanks.
I’m having trouble with my yellow brug this year (3yrs-old, 3ft tall with lots of Ys, located in Germany, on balcony in 14inch pot, well watered with drainage, fertilized regularly). It’s producing lots of blooms , but the leaves are not like previous years. Small leaves start growing, but turn yellow and fall off. Some leaves make it to a medium size. There is clear damage on most branches – cracked surface, in one case exposing the ‘core’ of the plant – some sort of disease? I sprayed it with commercial insecticide a month ago since most of our plants had pests, but no sign of pests now.
Also, I transplanted two branches in smaller pots this spring, and their leaves are big and beautiful (two months later: they’re starting to produce blooms that are bigger than the plants are!).
Thanks for any help.
Just some ideas and one question for those that love this plant:
I had some troubles with my Brug when planted in the ground, so I transplanted it to a wine barrel, and it loves it. I’ve also pruned mine to a tree form, and it’s natural growth creates a nice 8′ wide canopy which makes for a spectacular flower display.
I’d also suggest planting where evening breezes will carry the intoxicating fragrance to where people can appreciate it. Mine is 30′ away from the entrance, and it is immediately noticable.
My question is what feeds on the flowers? I’ve heard that bats are visitors, and its nightime fragrance would support that, or perhaps moths. Anyone know?
Enjoy!
Hi Carmel, I live in GA and see holes in my leaves also. I can never actually see any pests on it though. I have heard that slugs/snails love them but I dont see any trails. It has to be moths, or some kind of nocturnal caterpillar.
Shriveled leaves and no blooms
My Angel Trumpet is now growing small shriveled looking green leaves. I have watered and fertilized regularly. At the beginning of the season I had a slug problem. Also, I have not had any flowers this year.
I have… well, had a large Brugmansia in my back yard in South Louisiana. It was very tall and flowered constantly throughout the spring and summer. As we didn’t have a true frost last winter, we were worried about pruning and left the plant as is. As a result, the branches were extremely thick and heavy. We just suffered a very strong 24-hour period of storms which resulted in our Brugmansia splitting in two at the roots, with each half of the plant laying opposite the other.
Is there anything we can do to revive this beautiful plant? We’re newbies with this plant. Who am I kidding? We’re newbies with plants in general. Thanks!
well, i sprayed some catepillar stuff, but then the plant did its initial flowering. then i sprayed some malathion to kill a spider mite infestation. two days after the malathion spraying i started giving it brief foliar showers of fresh water in the unusually hot afternoons. i thought it might be the malathion, but i have now noticed several other burgs in my neighborhood doing the same thing. note: this particular tree was pretty messed up when i got to it. no flowers and only a few leaves. the leaves are doing great and there is lots of new growth. i have also started weekly feedings of a mild, balanced fertilizer. what n-p-k induces the most dramatic flowering? i’ll keep trying. s
I have a new angel trumpet I got this it was covered with blossoms and then they all fell off but one it was real pretty. How can I get the blossoms from falling off
Winterover Brugmansia
Hello-
I live in Portland, Oregon and I am just starting to grow these beautiful plants. I have a grouping of 5 of them that grew well in the ground over the summer and bloomed profusely. They are now about 6 feet tall, and I am wondering if I can mulch the roots and winter them over? Should I cut them back any? I believe I am in zone 8-9. Any help would be appreciated!
Brugmansia care in Ohio
Hi, i live in Ohio and i have angel trumpets and keep them all the time. I cut then back put the pots the basment.take the cuttings and cut them about 6-8in long put in damp dirt, root then plant in pot. pull them out in the summer and plant the new one’s.and have more.you have to feed them ever two weeks for to do good.and WATER WATER WATER. I have good luck. P.S.take in when it stays below 40 thay do not like it. i am looking for a red trumpet can you help me? I hope this help someone. Nov 1st 3:40am Karen S
Hi…I have a question rather than a comment. I love brugmansias, I have had a wide variety of colours but one plant in particular I cannot get to flower, it just keeps growing tall. I have cut it back but again it grows back without flowering. This has been going on for three years…any suggestions?
Tony
Not blooming
I do not know as it has never flowered. It does keep growing, I keep cutting it back.
Hi,
I live in the tropics. The climate can be hot and wet. I have just got a brug and am going it in a pot. I would like to place it on the ground and I wonder if it may be too hot for the plant.
Hi, I have a question for you. I have 2 Angel Trumpets in my flower bed that need to be moved. What is the best way to transplant them and what time of year is best, I live in north Alabama.
Hi,
I have a yellow angel’s trumpet in a sunny spot of my front yard in South Florida. It used to grow lots of beautiful yellow flowers, but now it has been infected by some pests. Some leaf became yellow and some other have just holes like they were bit, and the trunk looks like sick. I water it every morning and I spray it with a pesticide every week but, it seems doesn’t work. Do you have some suggestion to solve the problem?
I have a Brugmansia, I took cuttings and the new leaves that are coming are all curled up and almost plastic in texture. Why are they going this. HELP….I need help. I live in Canada and have ben told i can’t receive slips, only seed. Is there no supplier in Canada that provides slips.
Thank you for considering this request.
Mary
Hi all! We have a brugmansia in our backyard. I want to plant some herbs around the house, and there is a great patch near the brugmansia. Should I be concerned about planting something edible near it?
Thanks!
Hardy in Fla.
Do Brugsmansia grow well planted in the ground in Florida?
Marilyn McMann
hi all
we brought an established angels trumpet. it was almost flowering the flowers was almost blooming , it was in the ground when we bought it , we transplanted it in a big pot we noticed that that leaves and buds are drying out and starting falling. it is situated under a big tree so no direct sunlight…
advices needed here it is our first plant
TY all
Brug cuttings
Hello Brug lovers,
I have just bought two established Brug cuttings and planted them each in well drained pots and have fed them with Miracle Grow and watered regularly. They have been in the pots for approx three weeks. One of them seems ok but the other one’s leaves are starting to turn yellow and one of them has mottled brown spots on it. Can you tell me what I am doing wrong? I live in South East (Kent) of the UK and they are both in full sun position.
Thanks
I have a datura over grown on a property we just moved to, It has to be moved in the next 2 weeks as we are excavating that whole area.. What do you suggest? Can I take cuttings and move the whole plant or is that too much stress?
Hello, I have 3 trumpets. One plant has 3 opened blooms on it (orange) but the other buds are falling off before they ever open. I live in Jacksonville Fla. Can you please help me correct this problem before all my new buds fall off? I water every day, and I have each one in 30 gal buckets. They get morning sun until noon.
Thank you
transplant shock
I have just planted an angel trumpet tree and live in southern CA., it gets really hot here and the leaves wilt during the day but seem fine in the evening, I put an unbrella over the tree, but still wilts during the day…is this normal?? what should i do?