Hello all! My question is regarding a Japanese boxwood yamadori, 10-15 years old, located in 10b.

I was on a walk around three weeks ago and came across city workers digging a trench through a boxwood hedge. There was a beautiful boxwood with tons of movement that was about to get ripped from the earth. I asked the crew to let me try to salvage it and they did, but on the condition that I had only until their trench digger got within an unsafe distance. I called my wife and had her jump in the car with whatever potting soil was closest and the largest pot she could carry. The pot is a five gallon terra-cotta and the soil is Kellog Organic Raised Bed and Potting Mix.

I went at it fast and the roots were very difficult to excavate. There weren't very many; one large root branched horizontally under a sidewalk, the other two large roots were wrapped around a submerged utility pipe. I saved what I could, but it just seemed like there weren't many roots at all. Super-lean on the feeder roots too, obviously.

It's almost three weeks post-rescue. About a week after potting, most of the leaves - ~75-80% - turned yellow and yellow-brown. This soil just sort of stays damp, and now has a small colony of fungus nats. (On the bright side, I woke up to a bunch of tiny parasol mushrooms growing in the pot, so the soil's mycelial network is good) I feel like this soil retains way too much water and that I need to plant the tree in some proper soil, but I'm afraid of shocking it again so soon.

None of the yellowed leaves have recovered and there's no new growth, but we're maintaining some green foliage as well. I've been foliar feeding it water two to three times a day, and once a week I foliar feed it with a very diluted solution of kelp and fish meal.

It's sitting in an open, west-facing window under grow lights, and it also gets about 6 hours of direct sunlight per day. The humidity is ~70%, 100% of the time. Temp is ~70 daytime, ~60+ nighttime. I've watered it once since 6/11.

Does anybody have any suggestions on what I should (or should not) do at this point? Normally I'll pluck a yamadori, mix some of its native soil into whatever potting mix I have around and the tree will recover, but this one has me questioning everything. Please help if you can.

I think the tree should be outside, potted in a more freely-draining soil. But with few feeder roots, I'd say don't hold your breath on survival anyhow. You tried.

Put it outside in partial shade, don't fertilize it, don't change the soil until next year, and don't let it dry out.

It has had a pretty big trauma and needs to get over the shock.

Very nice tree.
A pity they are difficult to survive being dug out from the ground in the summer with few feeder roots.
I have lost a good one exactly the same way.
I hope yours survive, and chances are better if you place it outside.