I love these old-fashioned flowers, but have given up on them because they always seem to have half-eaten leaves and some sort of mildew/wilt problem. I could kick myself - a few years back I saw a recipe in a magazine for a homemade mix to deter the wilt and I cannot find it anywhere now. Anyone have a tried and true method for growing these flowers without having to hover over them and baby them to death? A companion plant perhaps? I am open to any suggestions!!! Thank you!

Plant them at the back of the bed where other plants will hide everything but the flowers? I don't know what the answer is here. I do know that the healthiest looking hollyhocks I ever grew(that is to say didn't purposely mow off) were in between some cedar trees. Maybe the bugs that demolish the leaves don't like cedar- I don't know.

I have had hollyhocks for years. They looked really good the first couple years, now every year they have that mildew-fungus stuff. You can get Bordeaux Mix to combat it, but every time it rains you have to re-apply. And if it stays humid very long, you just as well save your time. I'm sure the soil is contaminated with the fungus, but I don't have the time to keep up with them. They seem to grow best in spots where they have never grown before--like over the fence in the cornfield!

In one of my beds, I use the suggestion above, plant them in the background, then you don't notice the icky and dropping leaves. I have daylilies in front of them.

I had some funky, tiny beatle looking thing attacking mine last year. I picked off the offending critters and dropped them in a container of old dishwater. Then I'd blend them up after they drown, spray it on the plants and then dust with diatomaceous earth. The mildew/fungus thing can be controlled with cornmeal spray, which WORKS WONDERS on powdery mildew and black spot (search the forums for cornmeal spray). They do like lots of sun, too.

The cornmeal spray and the Bordeaux Mix (which is basically sulfur-based) are great mildew-icides(such a term?:|) The sulfur is best applied as a preventative, however. I've tried the skim milk..but on the hollys, it's not as effective as say, on roses or phlox. Different spores. With the hollys it's the rust and/or wilts or combination of both, OR maybe one causes the other. Kinda chicken:egg sorta thing, perhaps?

As others have said, try and plant them where loss of leaves (mine always wilt and get yellow at the base) at the back of the border (which you probably do, cause they're usually one of the tallest plants) and hide their bottom half with some good coverage plant. (*Gardeners, creative people and women, especially, are great at the art of camouflage! )

Finally...there's two other recipes you might want to try:
-The old baking soda. (3pts. BS to 1 gal. water) or
1pt BS to 2pts non-detergent soap to 1 gal. water).

-Chammomile Tea. Just brewed. Cooled and sprayed. (Especially on the underside).

And make sure to save some of the tea for yourself, to reheat, so you can calm yourself down, when and if any of the above remedies don't work despite all your efforts.

gardenz

Hollyhocks, in my garden are very susceptible to rust, even those I grew from seed from plants that had none growing in gravel behind a parking lot where they got no "fertilizer" and little water making me think that these plants need a really mean and lean soil and very little attention.
The hollyhocks growing behind that parking lot are in a really mean and lean soil, get absolutely no attention, and grow astonishingly well with no sign of rust or any other problem.

KimmSr~
Hmmm....that's interesting!! So....just need to quit babying the little buggers, huh? I know some flowers (especially some herbs) really do prefer a less fertile soil...maybe hollyhocks are that way too. I'll have to try the 'toss the seeds in the gravel by the barn' trick and see what I come up with!
Thanks for the information!!