Wintering hibiscus

Discussion in 'Woody Plants' started by vandra, Nov 5, 2006.

  1. vandra

    vandra Member

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    Location:
    North Vancouver BC
    I live in North Vancouver, BC and have a 6' hibiscus in a 13'' pot that I brought it indoors about a week ago to winter. It is placed near a west facing window, (although we have had little sun!) and now the blooms have all died before fully blossoming and the leaves are turning yellow at an alarming rate. It did extremely well when outside during the summer, can you tell me what should I be doing now to keep it flourishing?
     
  2. James D.

    James D. Active Member

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    Location:
    ottawa,ON. Canada
    First you should check it for any mites, white flies, or other insects. they will loose some leaves due to shock of being outside, they don't like temperatures below 10 degrees celcius so i hope you brought it in before that. Give it a very well lit area, the most sun you can give it and keep it moist at all times, but not too wet, and fertilize it about once every month with half strength diluted fertillizer. when it is time to put it back outsde give it a prune to encourage new growth and to develop more flower buds. remeber hibiscus like to be rootbound in their pots so i wouldn't repott for a while. if it does have mite i suggest spraying it wil either safer's insecticidal soap,horticultural oil or diluted rubbing alcohol. spary it once a week for about a month and only let the solution stay on the plant for about half an hour then rinse it off. i hope i have given you some help, if you have any other questions just give me an email.
     
  3. vandra

    vandra Member

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    Thank you for the info James. I don't think it has mites, so I guess it must be the shock of the change from outdoors to indoors, I don't think the temperature was lower than 10 degrees before I brought it in and it was still doing really well while it was outside. About half of its leaves have now turned yellow within about a week of bringing it inside, is there a chance it will recover from this?
     
  4. James D.

    James D. Active Member

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    yes it should recover from this, just keep it well watered and place it somewhere where it will get full sun for a good part of the day adn keep it warm inside and you can always prune it back a little bit to encourage new growth since the leaves are falling off. mites are very tiny and hard to see and they are not usually active outside because of the rin and humidity, so indoors where it is dry and has a lower humidity tey can become active and become a problem within a few days, not saying that it has mites but sometimes its hard to tell. i think your hibiscus will survive, just give it some extra TLC.
     

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