If your plant is only zone 5 hardy you may have issues. If it is zone 3 or 4 hardy you have less to worry about. I group up my six or so pots and let the leaves collect around them. One of my concerns is the sun heating the pots up EVERY day.

I'm looking into getting a variety of Abies koreana and Pinus sylvestris so I'm hoping they'll be okay. But the koreana is a zone 5 so I'm a bit worried. Is there any other way I can insulate it?

whats your base mother earth ...

where in z5.. it covers half the US ..

sylv is probably too aggressive for much longer than one year ...

if you are going to dig a hole.. take it put of the pot.. and repot in spring ...

do yo have a pole barn or unattached structure ... you may be leaving wind out of your variables ...

i will be gone all day .. any you have about 6 months.. so we have time to work it out ...

ken

Illinois, near Peoria-ish!

When should I put it in the ground then (maybe November?), I was just worried about the root system and all? And I was thinking since the sylv is a zone 3 plant, maybe it would be able to stay above ground?

I'm sure I can make a wind-break sort of structure. Put some stakes in the ground around the plant and cover that with clear plastic, would that work?

Thanks!

look at my first line..

NEVER use plastic ... you will create more problems than you solve.. trying to build a greenhouse.. rather than just protecting from the wind ...

be nice to now what size plant we are talking about.. 4 bales of hay.. with the top open.. will protect pots ...

you arent really protecting an otherwise zone appropriate plant ... you are dealing with the pots.. and ergo.. the roots ...

do you have all winter snow ... and how deep???

ken

That's true, slipped my mind. What material would you suggest?

I don't have the plants yet, but I'll be getting them soon within this month perhaps. How would you situate the hay around the pots? (And are you saying 4 bales for each pot or four for both? I'm guessing you'll probably need to know the size of the pots tho for this)

I'm all for planting them in the ground and keeping them there until Spring tho too. I just didn't know if there was going to be any root growth in which I could accidental harm the plant while digging it back up.

I'm not sure, as I just moved here and all, but I looked it up and it said over the entire past season there was an 'accumilation of 53.4 inches'. Idk if that would help tho since it didn't say when the snow melted and if more snow fell after, etc.

Also, is there any cons with buying/ordering conifers in the summer? (as I'm planning to do so)

a good seller.. will not ship in the heat of summer ... theirs nor yours ...

small conifers.. in pots.. can be tipped over.. and buried in snow.. and many will live ... i would put them on the north side of my house ...

straw .. make a box .. insert plants inside .. let snow cover ..

why are you ordering in plants .. if you dont have anywhere to plant them???? ..

in my high draining sand.. i have planted pots in late nov ... and pulled them out in early spring ... some died.. some didnt ... but i suspect its all about my sand ...

and i also used rose ones over small plants ... with the top cut open ...

ken

Oh okay, I was just confused about that as when I was on Conifer Kingdom, they're sending out their next shipment in June. I was thinking about just getting them local, as they would be already in decent sized pots so I wouldn't need to transfer them.

Okay, I'll try doing that!

I was to start a garden again for plenty of reasons and I've always seen people do it successfully in pots, so I thought I'd give it a try.

So the sand helped then? I was thinking about using either a 50% cactus mixture or a mix of perlite/bark/'other soil'.