severe winter damage ... dead leaves because of such ... fungus irrelevant ... its an effect .. rather than a cause of the browning ...

you need to ID the plant... prune off the dead stuff.. then prune it for shape, if anything left ...

and then move on to the next problem ...

i can not ID it on this pic.. others might ... i would guess euonomys ...

and if you want pruning help.. see you in the shrub forum ...

no evergreen.. holds its leaves forever.. and every now and then.. a bad winter rolls thru ... the future is all in the buds... of which.. there are none in your picture ...

you should give it enough time to bud out.. then remove the dead stuff that doesnt ..

those lease will soon fall off... pick them up if you want to ..

ken

Looks like it might be some variety of euonymus. Folks here will want to know if this spotting is occurring on only dead foliage or also on living? If so, pictures of live foliage will help. Also, did your winter in zone 7 have any abnormally cold snaps? Your general location would help, too.

After some research I am pretty sure it's a euonymus gold splash (attached is picture of live foliage). I am pretty sure the black spot are only on dead leaves which is why I though the black spots were killing the leaves.

I live in northern New Jersey and we had an abnormally horrible winter with tons of snow and single digit tempts for several days.

More than half of the shrub is like this - do I need to get rid of it? Or will it come back on it's own with time? Or is there a way to feed it to help it recover?

Like ken said and I was guessing, you are probably seeing the result of winter damage. Also like ken said, trim all the dead stuff out, rake the leaves on the ground and toss it in the trash, not in the compost bin as it probably is some type of leaf spot disease brought on by winter damaged tissue. However, wait and be sure that the last chance of frost has passed. Euonymus generally is pretty durable when cut back severely.

Thanks so much! I guess I know what I'll be doing this weekend :)

next fall.. after leaf color change on the deciduous trees... if you grab a handful... you will see that a lot of them have spots like this ...

fungus/mildews are two of mother natures composters ... mushrooms and all ... etc ...

my point was.. it would be pollution.. to try to spray.. dead leaves... so i wanted to clearly focus you on such...

going to post any pix of the buds.. or just wait and see ???

personally.. i got rid of all my E's years ago ... due to scale .. and other problems.. yours seems very thin ... i bet they are in heavy shade which they apparently arent enjoying ... you can probably do much better with a new plant.. OF SOMETHING ELSE ... i would have no qualms of killing this thing ...

i also see on your last pic.. it has the black spots also in summer ... it might be a mildew.. again caused by too much shade, among other things ...

and.. try to avoid adding guesses to titles.. because we tend to focus on them.. and sometimes it leads us astray ...

get rid of it.. if you are so inclined ... we can help you choose much better stuff ...

often ... decades ago.. things were planted.. and in full sun.. but sooner or later.. the shade trees end up shading the smaller full sun plants below... and you are better off getting rid of them... since not many peeps would cut down a huge shade tree.. for the scrub underneath.. and i will personally come and slap you if you did so.. for a eyuonomys .... lol.. not really.. but you get my point ....

take care and good luck

ken

Here is a link that might be useful: mildew on eyuonomys

I would cut your plants to the ground this weekend. They will do nothing but benefit from renovation pruning. It's best to do this before the new growth begins so that they don't expend more energy resources than they need to.

Woody plants have to bank carbon reserves in the fall and store them through the winter. In the spring, they begin withdrawing from the bank and spend it on new growth. Literally. If plants are forced to expend more energy than they have in savings, they go into debt. That will result in susceptibility to pest and disease problems, heat and cold intolerance, poor color, and weak growth.

So get the shrubs cut back to less than six inch stumps pronto. The whole plant, not just the damaged portions. I wouldn't fertilize, but keep the plants mulched.