As fall approaches, I am beginning to consider how I will maintain these great plants over the winter. Cuttings.. Overwintering the entire plant? What works best.. How do you do it.. Any and all info appreciated :)
Overwintering Brugmansia
I winter in the ground, take cuttings of brugs I'd like to bloom early, and use a bubbler in the GH, works great, never have to change the water and they root nicely. This winter, I'm setting up an additional bubbler in the house...
I do as Sherry will do. Last year brought the whole plant inside out of the cold and overwintered them by watering once a month letting them go somewhat dormant. This required alot of space. But this year, I'll take cuttings and use the bubbler system to get some growing quicker next spring. The rest of the plant will be wintered in the ground.
Here's some great info.
Great threads:
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/401992/
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/362328/
On Bubbler Systems:
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/523147/
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/519372/
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/498714/
Too sad to already talk about this. Why does the summer seem to be zooming by so fast. I am not even done with my spring planting! I just know Christmas is going ot be here too soon!
kell, don't yours just keep growing year around?
Jazz when I wintered brugs in z7a I put them in the basement where there wasn't much natural light. I watered them lightly and only when they were desperate. I ceased feeding them anything. When the weather warmed again I poured on the water and fertilizer. When it was safe outside I adjusted them to the sun.
Before you bring the plant in make sure it is pest free.
No, we have winter here. It is our rainy season. We get no rain or storms from April to November. Then the skies open and we get rain and storms from November to April. Nonstop. LOL. Last year we had a frost in November that killed my leaves and some die back and made them look terrible but than not another frost all winter.
I am hoping we have a mild winter. I live in fear of a killer frost. I move my best brugs into a hoophouse for the wiinter. This year I am going to get brave and put in a heater like Gretchen has. Our temps are usually in the 40s and 50s all winter with some dips into the 30s. So too cool for most plants to grow except for a few like violas. They love it.
Do you have a basement? I haul all my pots downstairs every year. First year, kept them all dormant, barely watered them, didn't lose one. Now, I have florescent lights, halide light. Temps stay 62 -73 all winter, they keep growing slowly, bloom almost all winter. Still barely water them!
I have a basement. I live in a 1920's farmhouse so it's the kind of basement that has 4 little windows around the top of the wall. is that enough light? I do have shop lights down there that I could move.
Oh Laura, the beginning of the end. LOL. You are so hooked. Soon you will have a forest down there.
First I will have to move out the boxes that I haven't unpacked yet from when we moved here.. heh heh
Well when I started to grow brugs I brought the couple of plants inside..they werent in huge pots at the time and kept watering them a little once a month...now after 5 years Ive gotten a small collection and some in huge pots...I brought most in last year since we had installed a gas heater in my breezeway..I had brugs blooming into December..then the bugs appeared..got aphids and used everything including the pick them off the calla lilys by hand...now this year..Ive got more brugs in huge pots and not enough roon for them all..Ive come to the conclusion that I have to let some go and take cuttings..ive used the quart jar method of keeping my cuttings alive without a bubbler and had no problems but then I didnt have a huge amount to keep alive..I had a maya and oleander growing together all winter and they loved each other..lolol...both doing great this summer..all the rest were in jars and glasses and anything that would fit on my dryer....oh to think about winter coming.....Judy
We have small windows(4) in basement. That is ok for going dormant, but DH installed a bunch of florescent and Halide lights, last year they bloomed from late Sept./February.
That's the way to go if you want to enjoy them almost year round.
Yes, it is an addiction, I started with a very small plastic green house just to over winter stuff in, it soon got full of Brugs, now I have 77 & a huge new green house to put them in. I am going to leave 2 in the ground cut back & mulched to see if they will pull through out winters. I'm in zone 7A. I like the bubbler too.
Bj
I only had 2 last yr., I kept them in my daughters garage in front of the 2 windows that she has. No heat but garage is extension of house and does not get down to freezing. They bloomed for quite a long time,long enough I got her hooked on them. She looked forward to coming home from work and smelling the brugs as soon as sje entered the garage.
She was just asking me this evening how big of a pot I would need to put that pink one in that I have planted in the ground. We have to save that.LOL
I live on the edge and trusted what I read on DG (thanks, LindaSC, from the bottom of my heart!!!!!) and, on Dec 14, after dark, time had changed, I made a flying run through the garden and made cuttings of all the brugs I wanted to backup, slapped them in the bubbler, just in time, the midnight hour, or our first hard frost. They all lived. I plan to do the same thing this year, and when the weather gurus (I use that term loosely) tell me there is going to be a hard frost (last year, the night before) I set up the bubbler, the whole shebang, the heater, the tubing, the pump, and cut them all, in a short period of time. Took me another while to find a bubbler stone, but I was perking from the get go, it was obvious that the bubbler was the way for me to go...this year I'll do the same thing, but I will strip all leaves, except the top knot, simply to keep the GH neater, without having to pickup all the leaves off the astroturf....I will have several bubblers in a variety of locations this year, just to see what happens...
so.. are you saying that you keep the cuttings in water all winter long?
Yes, I kept my cuttings in my bubbler from Dec 15/04, until I planted them in the ground, after Easter/05. The ONLY reason I didn't pot them earlier is because I broke my ankle on Feb 11/05, and, I never changed the water, the entire time they were in the bubbler and I used very little heat...I was amazed and it worked great!!
I truely believe that the cooler the water (in the bubbler) the heathier cuttings you get. What I really like is the "instant tree" you can get with the bubbler, in a very limited space!
Here's a trick I learned to keep the trees http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/467661/#top
I just got some cuttings today. I am wondering if I should I just leave them in a bubbler until next spring or plant them in pots when they take root. Will they grow much in two months or so before the first frost? What should I do? Thanks for any help.
Richard
I dig up the entire plant, cut it back above the Y to 6 nodes, wash off the dirt and trim the roots, and stick in buckets with a bubbler. Last year I kept them inside in the bathtub in the spare bathroom. There were about 12 plants in one bathtub. This year they will go in the greenhouse which stays on the cool side.
Since we have some fairly mild days in the winter I take them out once or twice a month, rinse the roots with 3% peroxide, trim off any funky roots, then put back in fresh water. Around the end of February I start adding a little fertilizer. That way I start off with trees in the spring.
Loretta
By the time it was cold enough for me to take my brugs to the basement for the winter I was glad to have a break from them. I made the sign of the cross with my fingers and told them to not show their faces again til Spring. ha! Totally dormant ... No fuss no muss.
And then I got my ghouse and had to deal with lots of fuss and muss lol!
Never did the bubbler thing. Sounds like a great way to save space.
I did stick some large cuttings of Charles Grimaldi in a bucket of water one year (no bubbler) and left them in the ghouse over winter. By Spring the root beards were sooooo huge and thick it was scary.
Are there any problems with the transitions between water and soil?
Jazz, I dont have trouble..alot of people tell me the water roots stop growing and you have to start all over again...mine continue to grow after I pot them up...also Ive had some cuttings in water for a year and a half..I was just too lazy to pot them up so finally got to them recently and I can send you a picture of them growing quite well..they started to get nice green leaves right away....Judy
Shadowgirl.. your entire plants that you put into the tub.. how did they do when you replanted? DId you pot up inside then work them out to full sun?
In this thread, you will find a photo of a batch of rootings, fresh outta my GH, earlier this year:
Dave's Garden Forums: Brugmansias: Over Wintering Brugs Outside & GH, zone 8a
This message was edited Aug 11, 2005 10:28 AM
Sherry, write it up like a link would..www.something....DG will hyperlink it for you....Judy
Sherrylike just go to the thread and copy the url then paste it in your message. Hope that works for you. I'd love to see this thread too!
Thanks, Judy, but using the www doesn't work either. I really wish someone would tell me what I'm doing incorrectly, the FAQs do not address hyperlinks. Whew.
This message was edited Aug 11, 2005 10:29 AM
Up on your bar below where it says, File...Edit...View...Go...Bookmarks...Tools...Help...
Look under it and you'll see the url. Example: http://davesgarden.com/forum/t/536332/#new....
Ooops look for this up on the bar, it's the url... {http://....davesgarden.com/forum/t/536332/#new....}
This message was edited Aug 11, 2005 10:35 AM
Now when you find this ...you left click after highlighting it and click on copy
Then go here ....in this box...and left click again and click on paste.
Hope this helped
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/536332/#new
just testing the copy paste thingy
Woooo hooooooo Jazz!! You did it!
letting the water in the buckets/cans get too deep was causing some of the bottoms to rot here.
I had 4 buckets crammed full of cuttings of all sizes, and couldn't really see in to know when they needed water. As a result I kept adding too much. I finally figured out (near spring, and after too many losses) that by drilling a couple of small holes in the side of the buckets that I could add water every time I watered the other stuff in the gh, and still keep the level in the buckets at 2-3 inches. The excess just runs out.
I've continued to use one bubble bucket all spring/summer to toss cuttings into that have broken off or whatever, to keep them fresh until I decided what to do with them, or had the time to do it. It's been really handy!
It's hard to accept that it won't be long at all before it's time to bring stuff back in!!
This is the url: http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/499349/
Thank you Julie and Judy!!! I can cut and paste all day, I tried the above captioned url several times and it did not work, but now it does, I guess I had to hold my mouth just right, lol!!
Lagata, put a tooth pick in the bottom of the cuttings to keep them from turning to mush or rotting from the bottom. You can also put stones in the container that will do the same thing. I never had a problem because of the amount of water in the container, but I will keep that in mind. I enjoyed using glass containers recently, to bubble, and really enjoyed watching them root, which started happening almost instantly.
I winter mine outside, and only take in fav cuttings and cannot imagine all the work necessary for wintering them inside, and i admire those of you that take them in, care for them all winter, then take them out when it's warm. I'm so grateful that I learned to use the bubbler and this year I expect to be able to refine the procedure. One thing for certain - I'll pot up MUCH quicker next growing season and get them out quicker too. I did not have any problems going from bubbler to soil, but that might have been because the season was spring and conditions were perfect.
Thanks again re the hyperlink, Julie/Judy, it nearly drove me nutz, especially since I tried that once and it didn't work. I'm posting the link again, lol, just to make sure I have it down. Hyperlink to photo of brugs after having been rooted in a bubbler:
http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/499349/
Thanks sherry; I may try that (toothpicks) on the smaller/thinner ones, since thay are the ones I lost quickest. A good 90% did great, but I mourned every loss. Lol! I really may like these plants too much!
Man you guys with your talk of winter is really bringing me down! LOL Say it ain't so!
We aquire so many new plants every year that must be brought in to survive winter if I ever want to see them again. My wife and I agonize over who gets to live and who doesn't as it just is not possible to keep a cutting or pot of them all. I have 2 1000 watt Metal halide grow lamps I use to keep some blooming all winter. I keep 1` set up in the bedroom! LOL I've found it helps us humans out a bunch by giving us sunshine therapy over winter so we don't get the depressing winter blah's too bad. I was lucky enough to get in good with my daughter's biology teacher and he let's me keep many plants in the Highschool's greenhouse over winter as long as I allow them to use them for the propagation/cutting experiments in class. He then sells off all the cuttings the student's don't want as a fund raiser for future experiments. Man he was getting 10$ a pop for baby passion flowers and brugs that weren't even blooming! It has me considering opening up an Ebay store to sell cuttings and seeds. Man if I could get 10$ per cutting and I can get 50 cuttings per tray of rapid rooter's...Man that adds up to some huge $$$!!! Now if I could only get organized enough to do it! LOL I find it more rewarding to trade and give them away to you guys;)
JD
You are most welcomed, Lagata, thank you!! LindaSC told me about the tooth picks first, someone else mentioned it too, but LindaSC is the one I 'heard', lol!! I didn't try it for the longest time, but one day I needed it and I had to cut mush off the cutting and it worked! I've also discovered that, if they are cut diagonally, they don't seem to mush, and if they do, I can see it quicker, while there's still time to try to, maybe, prevent it...
I had seen the toothpick application mentioned before but didn't or still don't understand the need. ? I haven't had any rot on the end but then all the brugs I've rooted in water has been with aeration. Maybe because I don't restrict the air flow to some fizz with a stone. I rubber band a fishing weight on the end so the air tube is at the bottom of the container and let that puppy boil. Lots of water movement and nothing can settle on the bottom.