You definitely should be fertilizing regularly, if the hibiscus isn't getting food it could be having trouble producing the pigment in the flowers. How often do you fertilize? Are the blooms the pale yellow as soon as they open and do they look healthy otherwise? I'm not sure if you've checked out this website or not but it's a gold mine of information, here's the section on Fertilizing. Also a link to the fertilizer they sell which I highly recommend: Fertilizer Hope you get it figured out! :)

Also - where are you? is it cold. tropical hibiscus may have two looks, one for summer and one for winter. the pigmentation production changes. my sunny wind went from yellow with red throat to bright orange, with a bit of red throat. its posted here somewhere. what's the name of your plant?

Thanks IvoryCirce. I only fertilized just after planting (around 4 months ago) and then about a week ago. I will definitely check out the links you provided. I am so scared of over-fertilizing and killing my plant. Yes the blooms are pale yellow as soon as they open and also quite a bit smaller than when they are orange other than that they seem healthy. Wish I had taken photos.

Thanks Merkity, I am in South Africa, Johannesburg. It's our summer now so really warm all the time. It is a Rosa-Sinensis.

Something else which only just occurred to me is that there are a lot of hen-and-chicken (Chlorophytum Comosum) plants surrounding my hibiscus. Could this be stealing all their fertilizer? I have been meaning to pull them all out as they grow like weeds just need to find the time.

You could start with a *much* more diluted mix of fertilizer and ease up to it so you can be sure your plant isn't stressed at all, that's what I did with one of my extra sensitive hibiscus who had grown up without fertilizer and didn't like the normal dose all at once, and it did great. :) Especially since it responded with giving you an orange flower after you fertilized last week, I'd say that's a good sign that it really needs some food. I fertilize lightly with every watering because my plants prefer less more often. Unless your soil is amazing, your hibiscus most likely isn't getting what it needs from it to produce those colorful flowers..

I'm not sure, but I was actually reading an article that was talking about plants stealing nutrients, wherein they were saying that seed-mates are able to recognize each other and that they shared the nutrients from the soil/food rather than fighting each other for it. Pretty interesting! I'm not sure it's your problem though..

This post was edited by IvoryCirce on Fri, Jan 16, 15 at 15:19

Thanks again IvoryCirce. I went to my local garden center on Saturday. They unfortunately didn't have anything like the HVH in the link you gave me but the lady there gave me something she claimed to be very good for Hibiscus (low phosphorus, high potassium). I think I will do as you suggested and start off with a diluted mix and slowly increase the strength. There are lots of little buds at the moment so I am hoping I see some improvement in the next few weeks. I will keep you posted ;) Interesting what you read about plants sharing nutrients instead of fighting for them. I am going to be pulling them out nonetheless as I can't keep up with the rate at which they spread. They're like weeds, trying to take over my garden :)