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| Hello,
I'm hoping that someone can help me. I bought 3 Eastern Red bud plants off of EBay last month. The plants are about 18 months old according to the seller. The very limited instructions that came with it suggested that the plants be placed in a gallon plant pot and be moved to the garage so that it can go into dormancy for the winter. I placed the plants into a large pot and put it in the garage, close to a window so that it can get some kind of light. I also have been watering it every few days. The leaves that the plants came with have all withered and fallen off. My question is should the plant be watered and given light while it is in dormancy or should i just leave it alone until spring to replant it outside? Please give me some advice since the seller is not answering any emails about the plants. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by mainegrower Z5b ME (My Page) on Sun, Dec 11, 11 at 5:44
| I'm going to resist the temptation of commenting on the dangers of buying uninspected plant material from eBay sellers. As to your question: the goal is to keep the trees dormant but with enough warmth to prevent the roots from freezing solid which can kill the plant. The leaves have dropped, so the trees have presumably entered dormancy. They do not now need any light. You need to be careful with the watering - don't let the planting medium become dust dry, but do not water every few days. Over saturation can easily lead to rot. If it's already very wet, I'd replant into just moist "soil". Redbuds also have very thin bark which can lose moisture even when they're dormant. Anything you can do to keep some humidity around the trees without saturating the planting medium - a cellar is often a better place than a garage - will help. There are two important factors for redbuds. The first is that redbuds grown from seed or propagated vegetatively very strongly duplicate the hardiness of the parent(s). Redbuds derived from trees growing in MN will be far hardier than ones with VA paren(s). The second is this: redbuds and a few other trees often enter a state of deep dormancy that needs to be broken by a process known as "sweating". I'm sure detailed instructions are available online, but,briefly, "sweating" involves significantly raising the temperature and humidity level around the plants. |
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- Posted by ken_adrian z5 (My Page) on Sun, Dec 11, 11 at 9:47
| where are you redbud .. if in fact that is what they are.. are deciduous .. they lose their leaves ... in winter which also means they go dormant.. which further means.. THEY DONT NEED much WATER at all ... once the media is properly moistened ... where are you.. what media did you use ... what zone are you.. and why does the pot have to be in the garage ... MORE INFO PLEASE ken |
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| If you're somewhere where the soil hasn't frozen yet, I'd strongly recommend planting them directly in the soil, or at least sinking the pots into the soil. This will give the roots the insulation of the earth like they'd have in nature rather than worrying about the temperature fluctuations of your garage all winter. |
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