Satsuki Azaleas in Winter

[August44]

That is mostly just the chinzan and wakaebisu. There are a fair number of others. Crazy thing is that I don't even really like azalea accept for accents on rock plantings.

Me thinks you need to have a sale, right here, right now!

 

[badatusernames]

I only have 1...it’s in a greenhouse between 32/34 degrees..in the winter

same

My azalea is the only plant I have that I board at a nursery. When I got it, I got the impression that it needed to be protected, say in a garage or bulkhead, out of light, out of wind, and that it was very important that it never get under 10 degrees F during its dormancy. Watering also sounded very finicky compared to other bonsai. 10 degrees seems low compared to what people are saying here, though. Mine is a Kozan.

I could be wrong on this - this is all just what I heard after I bought it - but the more I looked into it the more I decided that for now I'd rather just pay the boarding fee at NE Bonsai. I don't have a garage unfortunately.

Interested in seeing what others have to say here.

 

[johng]

Me thinks you need to have a sale, right here, right now!

Glad to...anyone that shows up at my garden, I'll give a 10% discount on one tree for each hour that you spend pulling weeds...up to 50% off

 

[August44]

Glad to...anyone that shows up at my garden, I'll give a 10% discount on one tree for each hour that you spend pulling weeds...up to 50% off

I'll be down, but you can cancel the weed pulling. How do I get there?

 

[Harunobu]

same

My azalea is the only plant I have that I board at a nursery. When I got it, I got the impression that it needed to be protected, say in a garage or bulkhead, out of light, out of wind, and that it was very important that it never get under 10 degrees F during its dormancy. Watering also sounded very finicky compared to other bonsai. 10 degrees seems low compared to what people are saying here, though. Mine is a Kozan.

I could be wrong on this - this is all just what I heard after I bought it - but the more I looked into it the more I decided that for now I'd rather just pay the boarding fee at NE Bonsai. I don't have a garage unfortunately.

Interested in seeing what others have to say here.

Kozan/Nikko won't be hardy in your zone, as garden plants. They might die. Or they may do very poorly after all the decently cold winters. I am not sure. I definitely wouldn't keep your Kozan bonsai outside all winter. Hardiness zones are rated by the minimum temperature one can expect. So I don't know if you have consistent winters or not. But once you get a winter worthy of zone 6, it will kill your Kozan bonsai if it is unprotected. I would give Kozan/Nikko landscape plants a shot if I lived in zone 6, though. They might pull through. It may take 20 or 50 years for a really cold winter to come about and kill them. Kozan/Nikko are said to be among the most hardy of satsuki.

 

[Forsoothe!]

I think it all depends upon where the plants come from and/or versus the micro climate you are in. Satsuki is kind of loose term and they are bred from a wide range of parents. I would count on how they listed by the seller more than anything else along with your own general practices. All my hardy plants are mulched-in setting on my garden soil in full sun and I lose very little unpredictably in winter. What I loose is usually a plant in margin health going into winter and plants bought in autum. We all press our luck with growing stuff that is marginal in our own climate. In that same vein the history of plant matters, too. A young, healthy starter that you buy in spring and grow all summer is probably less problematic than a mature bonsai grown elsewhere by someone in a more friendly zone and maybe babied, too. Plants adapt.

 

[badatusernames]

Kozan/Nikko won't be hardy in your zone, as garden plants. They might die. Or they may do very poorly after all the decently cold winters. I am not sure. I definitely wouldn't keep your Kozan bonsai outside all winter. Hardiness zones are rated by the minimum temperature one can expect. So I don't know if you have consistent winters or not. But once you get a winter worthy of zone 6, it will kill your Kozan bonsai if it is unprotected. I would give Kozan/Nikko landscape plants a shot if I lived in zone 6, though. They might pull through. It may take 20 or 50 years for a really cold winter to come about and kill them. Kozan/Nikko are said to be among the most hardy of satsuki.

that’s good to know, thank you... i’ll just keep boarding it with NE Bonsai, it did great with them last year. i knew it wasn’t a great idea when i bought it, but i really do like it

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

. All my hardy plants are mulched-in setting on my garden soil in full sun and I lose very little unpredictably in winter. What I loose is usually a plant in margin health going into winter and plants bought in autum. We all press our luck with growing stuff that is marginal in our own climate. In that same vein the history of plant matters, too. A young, healthy starter that you buy in spring and grow all summer is probably less problematic than a mature bonsai grown elsewhere by someone in a more friendly zone and maybe babied, too. Plants adapt.

Some good points here!

At the Pacific Bonsai Museum, all the satsuki are much older. We have a number of these growing out in the ground exposed to the prevailing wind, not by any special design, its where the grow beds are. They are growing well, but they are all older, tried and true cultivars like Eikan, Kaho, Kakuo, Jugoya and Kinsai. In contrast othe potted ones are all in the cold house.

I contrast, those at my home are all Satsuki which are 5 years old or younger. Any satsuki or other azalea new less than 3 years old I keep in a cold frame, with the pots dug into the ground.

The older ones are all in ground, protected by a covered enclosure for three reasons.
First, to keep them out of the drying wind, which seems to be the biggest hazard to their health in our area to younger satsuki. Second to keep the azaleas under cover. We get at least two week long freezes here on average, often followed by a rain on snow/ice event which ends up dropping chunks of snow andice from the trees falling onto the satsuki.. Finally to keep the *@$%& rabbits from chowing down on the news grows.

On the other hand, all the Kurume, Gable, Harris, Pericat, etc are in the ground, in the ope, fending for themselves and do just fine. I don’t know why the rabbits prefer the satsuki, I think it’s their location, but thats just a guess.

cheers
DSD sends

 

[Harunobu]

that’s good to know, thank you... i’ll just keep boarding it with NE Bonsai, it did great with them last year. i knew it wasn’t a great idea when i bought it, but i really do like it

That's 'Kazan', not 'Kozan'. Might be a tad less hardy.

 

[Forsoothe!]

I should have added that my situation of over-wintering is good for me, but is a consequence of what I can do on my property. If I had the property to do it, I would have a pit and they would all go into it. Modifying Mother Nature's slings and arrows is always a lot better than suffering from rabbits, deer, muskrats, groundhogs, heavy snow turning into nine pound clumps of ice on a key branch, the occasional winter from Hell and so on.

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

I'm in zone 5a. No question our "normal winter" will have 3 to 15 night's with temperatures colder than -10 F, about -23 C. I live in a hundred year old farm house that includes a below ground well house, no longer in use. What looks like a patio in the back yard is an underground room that before the city surrounded and subdivided the farm, held the wellhead. All my satsuki go into the well house when it gets to the low 20's F at night. I have a small fan running in the well house to keep air moving, it runs 24 hours. There is no light. No grow lights. Nada. If I wait to fill the well house until the ground has cooled down to 40 F or cooler, the well house stays between 32 F and 40 F all winter. This is cold enough that the azalea show no sign of stress even though they spend about 4 months with no light. Key is the temperature stays below 40 F. If it got warmer, the Satsuki might be stressed by lack of light. But being colder than 40 F, or 4 C, keeps them dormant.

I bring them out in spring, and they bloom on time, in late May and June for the Satsuki, and late April or sometime in May for the kurume hybrids.

 

[Deep Sea Diver]

Here’s an excerpt from Henning’s Home Page, (rhodyman) an awesome Rhody/azalea site about over wintering young evergreen azaleas.

It’s not a bonsai site, but a really common sense site for horticultural matters and a wide variety of other items.

Most evergreen azaleas may be propagated from stem cuttings. Most evergreen azaleas do not develop their full hardiness until after three seasons. In general, they need protection their first three winters after they are rooted. Normally, they will be grown in a protected area the first winter. Then they will be container grown in protected areas the second year. Then the third winter they will be field grown in a somewhat protected area. Then the fourth winter they should have reached their full hardiness.

Cheers
DSD sends

 

[kale]

Curious what you all think of my winter setup. Its a window well with clear tarp over the top that stays between 40 and 45. Im wondering if I should peel a little tarp back to lower the temp a bit?

 

[Leo in N E Illinois]

Generally 40 F is used as the benchmark, where 40 or below, vast majority of trees are fully dormant. For Satsuki, 45 F is probably cold enough to keep them dormant, but 45 F will not be cold enough to keep Japanese maples fully dormant. They will start growing on you before it's safe to put them out.

It's species by species, there is no handy data for most species, so we assume the 40 F temp, and it seems to generally work.

 

[badatusernames]

That's 'Kazan', not 'Kozan'. Might be a tad less hardy.

Thank you! That's good to know

 

[shinmai]

All of my non-tropical trees spend the winter in a 6’ by 6’ greenhouse. That includes about thirty azaleas, roughly half Satsuki and half domestic nursery stock. I use a space heater on a thermostatic controller set at 37 degrees and a small fan running continuously. When it’s going to get really cold, like into the teens, I add another heater on a separate power strip to run full time, and the heater on the thermostat supplements it to keep the temperature stable. This will be my third winter using this setup, and so far so good.