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Written By Hana Ruf

Overwintering Outdoor Plants

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HEY PLANT FAM!!!

Thanks for your interest in joining The Bloom Club. I’m so excited to talk all things PLANTS with you! Apologies on just finally sending out the first newsletter - summer was busy and now harvest time is even more busy! So let’s get straight in to it, shall we?

Fall is here and it’s time to start switching our mindset from outdoor plants to indoor! Here’s a list of things September brings to my mind:

-what plants do I have outside that need to be brought in

-What annuals do I want to bring it to try and overwinter?

-Are there any biennials or perennials I want to plant this fall?

-Is there any garden prep for next season that I need to get done this fall? 

-How do I use up all this zucchini?!?!?

Bringing Plants from Outside to Inside

This time of year your plant leaves will start yellowing. This is a sign they are beginning to shut down and thus we need to reduce watering. It’s also a sign to start thinking about what plants need to be brought inside before the first frost. Some plants I plan to bring in this winter are herbs, succulents, ferns, my mandevilla and begonia.

How to Safely Bring Plants Inside:


1. Get ready. Figure out what plants you want transferred to a new pot and which might stay in their current pots. Make sure you have enough potting soil and the proper potting soil on hand (regular potting mix for most, succulent mix for the succulents). Get whatever tools you need such as a trowel, sheets and gloves. 

2. Clean up the plants. Once I’ve figured out what pot I’m using for each plant, I like to trim any dead or unwanted leaves while they’re still outside. 

3. Insect control. Check the plants for disease and insects from the soil up. Make sure to look on under side of the leaves as insects like to hide there. Even if I don’t find any bugs, I always spray the plant down with a house-safe insecticide, such as an insecticidal soap, neem oil, or pyrethrin based spray. I also keep the plants away from my indoor plants for a while to be safe once I bring them in!

4. Refresh & repot! I prefer to repot all my plants because I am paranoid about insects and just feel getter starting with fresh soil in the house. Plus, I usually need to downsize to a smaller pot. If you don’t want to do this, that’s totally ok! I recommend scraping off the first few inches of soil and replacing it with new soil. This will give some fresh soil and nutrients to the plant and remove any insect eggs laying on top of the soil. Repot any others with fresh soil. 

Overwintering Begonias:

Tuberous plants such as begonias are easy to overwinter and you will be rewarded with bigger plants the next year. Here’s what to do:

  • A couple weeks before the first frost, begin cutting back on watering. 

  • Before the first frost, cut back the plant: leave about 1” of stem above the soil.

  • Take plant out of pot and remove loose soil using your hands from the tubers, but keep the soil immediately surrounding it on. This will help keep the tubers from drying out.

  • Place it on a frost free surface for 24 hours to dry

  • You can store them over winter either in soil or sand in a pot, OR my preferred method is to keep them in a paper bag or cardboard box with packing paper. I recommend keeping them in the basement or heated garage where there is less light and cooler temps. As long as it doesn’t get below 7 degrees Celsius or get too hot!

  • Be careful, out of sight of of mind isn’t totally what we want here. Set a reminder on your phone to check them once in a while to make sure there is still some soil on and that it’s not too dried out. If it is dry, dunk it in some water, let it dry, then put it back in the paper bag. 

Let me know if this works for you! I have only tried this a few times. My first couple times were a lot of trial and error and I didn’t have much success, but once I set a reminder in my phone and kept them in proper storage, I began to succeed! If this method doesn’t work for you at first, play around with it! It can be quite dependent on your house temperatures, humidity, etc and one storage method might work better than the other for you.


Well, that’s all for the first Bloom Club Newsletter. Let me know what else you’d like to talk about! :)

Happy planting,

Hana

Hana Ruf