I am doing mine now I have found for me I can start about feb 1 when they are still dormant. Just do not disturb the root ball and they will love you when they wake up. If I repot in the fall I get set backed in growth the next year. I just make no more moves after the 4th ofJuly.

That's what I thought I remembered from seeing this discussion last year. I only have one that I need to move, my 4th year Guacamole. Thanks, Paula.

Speaking of pots and moving plants, do you always start your new ones in one gallon size containers, or do you ever start any of them off in a larger size? I don't have a million of them like some of you and I use clay pots for all of my plants, so I have a wide variety of pot size choices.

bk......I have never potted mine in anything less than an 8 -10 inch pot, but I don't think I have anything that will stay small.

We are also in for a few cold days in the 30s and 40s (a heat wave to you Northerners) so I am waiting for another burst of warm days to repot. What would you say the average amount of time is before you have to repot most of your plants from the original 8" pots? My Guacamole probably should have been repotted last year but it did great and made a huge leap, so no harm done there.

you can kill a small babe.. in a large pot... you are always better off starting with a small pot .. and up potting when the roots hit the drain hole ...

you can repot a dormant hosta.. any time you want ..

i would avoid disturbing the roots.. just after they awake ... seems like that would be the worst time ... to interfere with roots pumping water .. presuming you are removing all the old media ... which you should ...

it was 9 below last night.. its that time of year.. when i hate you warm zone peeps ... lol

ken

How exactly do you determine what a small pot is for a new plant? For instance, when I potted my hostas from Hallson's last year, mostly in the shorter 8 inch pots, the roots were all longer than the pot was tall. A for the ones I potted in the taller 8 inch pots, some of the roots came very close to hitting bottom. Or....do you consider the width of the pot to be a determining factor also? The ones I plan to order soon from NH say they come in 4 inch containers. That, of course, will be a different situation than what I experienced from Hallson's.

From what I've heard, the NH hosta are smaller than what you get from Hallson's. I don't have personal experience, so take it for what it's worth. So, just pot them up a little larger than what they are in now.

As long as you keep your hosta watered and fertilized, you almost don't have to worry about the pot. Babka has left some in pots until the roots distort the pot (keep in mind it's not hot there). I up pot them when I can't keep them watered, or when the pips are coming up at the edges of the pot, or they quit getting larger.

Ditto what Bkay and Ken said. I take a look at the root system and put it into a pot that it fits with just a little extra space. Even when you up-pot, only go up one size at a time. I have had the same experience as Ilovetogrow with up-potting after August. It sets them back for me too.

-Babka

I knew from conversations last year that late winter was a good time to repot. I only had one to repot, which I did a few minutes ago. The media was damp and when I emptied it out it was so root bound that it came out like a solid brick. I knew last summer it was ready when I couldn't get my finger deep enough into the media to check the moisture. I moved it from a 10.5 X 9 inch pot to a 11 X 11 inch pot. This is my first hosta, a 3 year Guacamole, which did a massive leap last year. I'm anxious to see what it does this year.

NH hostas are smaller than Hallsons which are field grown. NH tells you what size the pot is or that it is a starter plug. They also have some gallon or 2 gal sizes too. The starter plugs will come wrapped in damp towels and plastic wrap. The 4" pots come as a planted plant. They did well for me and I will find a photo later.

I let the roots to tell me what size of pot to use. I go one (1) inch around the roots to determine pot size. I also only use plastic. I do not use clay. I find with our hot summers that the pot will wick the water from your soil. I have to water twice once for the plant and again for the pot. Ask at Lowe's if they do not mind if you take the recycle pots if you need more.

Hi all, I’m fairly new to hosta & I’m just curious. What’s the advantage of using pots for hostas instead of planting them in the ground? In general I use a pot to cuddle a baby before it’s big enough & strong enough to cope with the real world, Or I’ll use a pot to try a plant in different locations before deciding on a permanent home, then plant it in the ground. Or if all the space is taken for a given type of light, pots give me extra space. Or if the roots form huge rhizomes that can take over a bed, I’d rather keep it in a pot that spend 20 yrs pulling out tubers. Or if it's a plant that doesn't like wet feet. But I see whole gardens of pots, which in a warm climate obviously need to be watered frequently. What’s the advantage of pots? Beautiful Guacamole, Santamiller. Thanks!

There are several reasons for me. My first failure with hosta was in the ground. The slugs ate them, they didn't grow and my neighbor gave my dogs treats right where they were planted.

My first success with hosta was in pots. I took the above hosta and stuck them in a pot. Since it worked, I kept doing it.

We have black gumbo for soil here. It's hard, black, alkaline clay. I didn't want to do the soil preparation necessary to plant hosta.

My shade is all under pecan trees. I didn't want to dig between all those roots of amend the soil.

All I can say is that it works for me.

bk

Santa, I like the way your Guac looks with the vinca. Very pretty.

bk

I have beach sand and tree root invasion so for me pots work perfect. I can also use less water. I can also move them with little or no trouble when in the mood.

For me, here in CA, where it only freezes about every 9 years, the ground doesn't get cold enough, but a shaded area with good air circulation gets down to the low 40's during the nighttime hours, giving them their required dormancy time. I'm on a small suburban lot in Silicon Valley and everything, except some of the deciduous trees, remains green all winter. At first I did try one in the ground but it disappeared after 3 years.

During the hosta growing season, I arrange my favs on the deck just outside my familyroom/kitchen so I can enjoy them. The rest are in a shaded atrium. When they are dormant I can put them all in that atrium where I don't have to look at bare pots.

My latitude is about the same as southern Illinois, so I am not a southern gardener, but the San Francisco Bay (about 5 miles from here) and the surrounding mountains provide me with a very moderate mediterranean mild climate.

...And just like Bkay, I have no room to stick them in this adobe soil filled with tree roots.

-Babka

I started the same way as bk, basically from not knowing any better and learning from mistakes. I bought two hostas 3 or 4 years ago and planted one in the ground and one in a pot. My yard is fairly large, I have tons of shade and the soil is good enough but the pill bugs made short order of the one in the ground. They could eat a hosta the size of a redwood overnight here in San Antonio. The one in the pot did fine, so I bought a couple more, potted them and they did fine over the next year. Only after that did I start getting serious about hostas, did some further research and especially after discovering this forum a little more than a year ago did I start learning about the chill factor, which pots play a huge part of for warm weather areas, and other things related to keeping hostas happy long term. Being in pots you can also move any of them around that might start getting too much sun/heat if need be during certain times of the year. There are a handful of Southern hosta keepers here who have been especially helpful to me due to their similar climate as mine. After 3+ years I'm still a nervous hot weather hosta freak, but it is indeed possible using pots.

Thanks so much bk, ilovetogrow, babka & santamiller, now I understand. I've seen pictures of your beautiful hostas so I can see that you have found the right technique! Very helpful info.

Most of my hosta are in the ground, but I have a few in pots to move around as decorations on the deck or to fill in when something in the flower garden dies. The only repotting consideration I have is whether the soil in the pot is wet. If it is, I'll move the pot undercover for a few days so I'm working with it when it's fairly dry. I'll also give the plant a shake to loosen it just a bit, but I don't disturb the roots too much unless I'm splitting up the plant.

A very good suggestion about making sure the soil is not wet. I will remember the next time I need to repot.

Patti, the potting soil will break down eventually and become like mud. It takes a while, though. I had always just up potted to the next larger size and filled in the edges. My "big blue" was many years old when I got my demon dog, Cleo. She knocked them over repeatedly (just one of her puppy tricks). The next spring, my old hosta came up with tiny little eyes after being 100 or more eyes the previous year. When I unpotted it, all the upper potting medium was like clay. I washed everything off and repotted in new soil. Someone (I think it was Steve_Mass) said you should do completely new soil about every 5 years.

This was the spring before we got Cleo in the late summer (This is about 4 ft. across)

This was the 1st spring after we got Cleo

This is what I found when I unpotted the hosta

I may have continued to skate with that clump in there. I don't think I would have ever looked that deeply if I had not had a problem. I think that every time it it was knocked over, the roots were sheared between the mud and the looser soil.

It recovered (I now have two pots of big blue). This is one of them in 2014.

I somehow knew that dog would prove useful.

-Babka

Gorgeous plant, bk!

We are lucky to have old hounds more interested in laying in the sunshine than anything else in the yard. Maybe the truth is all those potted plants just need a full house cleaning every once in a while. My african violets like fresh soil every other year. I wish my garden wasn't covered in snow! It's snowing here again today. [insert big sigh here]

I understand. It's been a cold, wet, snowy, sleety, rainy, freezy week here. I put 26 hosta with pips in the garage last Sunday. They're still there. It's supposed to get down to 34 overnight tonight, which is the first night since last Sunday above freezing. I have to get them out, as they are in the dark. So Sweet and Wolverine have leaves. It's supposed to be down to 29 Wednesday night. So, I'll have to put them all back.

I used to grow African violets. Hosta remind me of them. The mounding shape, the flowers held above the leaves and the symmetry are all similar.

I forgot to mention that it's supposed to be 70 on Tuesday. It's like a yo-yo.

bk

Babka, she is getting better. She is REALLY smart. She's a hunter and a hound, and not too people oriented. I was sure if I sent her back to Dallas animal services, that she would not survive. She's just not too interested in what people think or want. She was a little slow to adapt, but she's getting there.

bk

I just finished a good sized order from Hallson's [btw, they have a 5% off total order sale til March 17] I have lots of roses and daylilies, but only a few hostas. A huge Sum & Substance outside my office window that gets bright light, but shade on roots that outdoes itself every year. A Blue Angel in a pot, and a smaller one in a pot. I have been looking at hostas and making lists for a couple of years, finally decided to make this order. I have ordered several giants, Abiqua Drinking Gourd and 6 small ones. I have a nice bed under a big oak that I would like to put the small ones, but am now wondering if I should pot these up? Also have an Empress Wu from Naylor coming later this month. Looks like I should plan to pot all these up......am I correct in this? Didn't realize that pill bugs and slugs wrecked so much havoc on these plants. Any other suggestions to offer? I am not that knowledgeable about hostas yet, and would appreciate any advice. I am about 2 hours NE of Houston. Thanks! Judith

You have a Sum and Substance growing in the ground in full or all day indirect light near Houston? Maybe I need to move my potted one into more sun! Most of us in the southern zones keep most if not all in pots. The thicker leafed ones can withstand the pill bugs but they will make short order out of most of them. If you do a Google search or just go back through the pages of threads here you will find a ton of info from a few of the folks here who have experience keeping potted hostas in the South. The one hosta that I do have in the ground is an Abiqua Drinking Gourd. I have had it for three years and it's survived, but the growth has not been remotely as much as the one I have in a pot.

Guess it is just dumb luck its doing so well, and has been there for years. Its in a corner that faces west, and get really bright sunlight much of the day, but there is giant lirope growing in that bed, so that might shade it a bit. Never a burnt leaf. Think the garage corner shades it from the really intense western sun as it is going down, so maybe all these factors are to its advantage. I just ordered Abiqua Drinking Gourd, but sounds like I had better pot all these. I ordered several small ones........do these go in gallon pots or should they be in bigger ones? Finding out I have a lot to learn about hostas - roses and daylilies have been my thing for years. Any particular soil they like? What about fertilizing? I have never fertilized my Sum & Substance. Just ordered Sum for All - can anyone comment on this one? Thanks a lot!

Judith

Judith, go back up to the top third of this thread. We discuss pot sizes and plant sizes. If I were ordering giant hosta from Hallson's, I'd start with a 12" pot. You want a well draining soil. I mix miracle grow with about 1/2 small pine bark mulch. Most people use Miracle Grow for fertilizer, some at 1/2 srength. You said a couple of hours north of Houston, so I'm guessing you are in the piney woods. Regular MG should work for you. I'm switching to MG azalea food. Since I'm in Dallas, we have alkaline water. The azalea food should provide some acid for the hosta. They like acid soil.

bk