How to Grow Azalea Plants

Azaleas are flowering shrubs making up part of the genus rhododendron. There are two major differences between azaleas and other rhododendrons. Azaleas are smaller, making a good house plant, and they flower in singular large blooms, whereas rhododendrons produce long strips of smaller blooms. Read on to learn more about how to grow azalea plants.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Organic soil
• Canadian peat moss
• Ironite powder
• 4-inch diameter pots
• Water
• Azalea seeds
• Milled sphagnum moss
• 2-inch wide pots
• Toothpick
• Fluorescent white light
• Water mister
• Plastic wrap
• Diluted generic liquid fertilizer

Growing Azaleas

1. Begin by filling the 2-inch wide pots with an inch of milled sphagnum peat moss. Gently firm and level the sphagnum. Sow the seed on the surface of the sphagnum. About 20 seeds per pot should be sufficient. Settle the seeds on the surface of the germinating medium with a fine water mist, when the seed stop moving you have misted enough. Cover the container with plastic wrap, one that can seal the container sufficiently to maintain 100 percent relative humidity.

2. Place the pots under a fluorescent white light, about a foot away from the pots, for eight hours each day. The seedlings should sprout after two to eight weeks. You may have to remove the plastic wrap and mist the top of the pots a few times each week. It should always remain very damp to the touch. When the seedlings have four leaves each they are ready to be transplanted.

3. Use a toothpick to tease out the roots of an azalea seedling, holding it by a leaf to steady it. Brush away any remaining debris from the root system and then dunk it in a diluted solution of liquid fertilizer. Repeat this for as many seedlings as you want.

4. Prepare the new pots by filling them with a mixture of Canadian peat moss and organic soil. Poke a hole about a 1/2-inch deep into each pot and gently place a seedling in each. Place the pots back under the light for 16 hours each day. Mist them for the first month, after that leave the pots in a window sill that gets light for about six hours a day. The root system of an azalea must be bound tightly to ensure full growth and flowers, which is why you used such little pots. To water them from this point forward simply dunk the entire plant and pot into a bucket of water until air bubbles cease to rise to the surface.

5. Water the azaleas weekly and fertilize them with a little ironite powder every three months. The azaleas should not need to be re-potted for at least three years.

Tips & Warnings

• The bloom of the azalea is toxic and is commonly ingested by dogs, causing them to become very ill. If you own dogs then keep the azaleas up out of the dog's reach. Azalea leaf gall can be particularly destructive to azalea leaves during the early spring. Handpicking infected leaves is the recommended method of control.

Resources

• Video guide explaining azalea care