Indoor Acer

Hello there! Just before Christmas I bought 4x sml Acers in the sale at £2.50 each. They're in 10.5cm pots. I put them on the windowsill in my cold utility, with the intention of potting them up and putting outside. Never got 'round to it and now, the acers are really budding up, well ahead of the ones outside. So, if I put them outside now, with -4* temperatures overnight, will those leaf buds die off? Should I wait until temperature rises? Any advice would be most welcome, thank you!

 

Hi ,

if me I would leave on your windowsill .. small acers like yours may not survive minus 4 outside .

come end of March put out during the day and bring back in overnight to get them accustomed to being outside just as you do with annual bedding plants … do that for two weeks then they can stay out
April you can repot when they will grow away quickly , dont do know they won’t root and just sit sulking
spruce

 

That's excellent, thank you! Yes, I think they'd just freeze in their pots, especially as I haven't been able to pot up yet! Great advice, I'll leave them where they are until the temperature picks up, then gradually acclimatise them to outside. Brilliant!

 

I agree totally - they'll now need to be acclimatised as they've been undercover all that time, but it's better to wait a couple of months before starting that, and it will also dpened on where you are in the country because there are huge variations in climate. The pots are very small, so those are really immature little plants which need protection for longer.
The repotting can happen once they get going again - doing that just now can create problems due to them sitting in too much damp compost/soil, as they won't really start growing properly for a while, even when protected. Woody plants of any kind are slower growing, but once you have them acclimatised to your conditions they'll manage well.
The opposite kind of weather will also be difficult for them once they're outdoors, so keep them somewhere that they won't be sun and wind scorched too over summer. Some shade through the hottest part of the day, and out of the path of your prevailing winds.

 

Thank you so much for the advice! I'll certainly leave potting up until the temperature rises, and I've had a chance to get them used to being outside. One of them actually has leaves opening up now, and I was worried that the warmer indoor temperature is causing them to leaf up prematurely.