A Complete Guide to Autumn Care Techniques for Household Potted Flowers
In autumn, temperatures drop, mornings and evenings turn cooler, and daylight hours gradually shorten, so the physiological activity of flowers shifts from a vigorous period into a slower period or dormancy. During this time, how should potted flowers at home be cared for?
To prevent potted flowers from being harmed by the cold, they need to be moved indoors. The timing for moving potted flowers indoors should differ depending on the type of flower. Warmth-loving flowers such as Chinese hibiscus, poinsettia, jasmine, Swiss cheese plant, and begonia should be moved indoors when the temperature is around 10°C. Spider plant, asparagus fern, Chinese tulip tree, and rubber plant should be moved indoors when the temperature drops to 5°C. Slightly cold-tolerant flowers such as kumquat and plum blossom can be moved indoors later. The vast majority of flowers should be moved indoors before Frost's Descent.
After potted flowers are moved indoors, attention should be paid to ventilation. When the temperature is relatively high at noon, doors and windows can be opened for ventilation and heat dissipation. The placement of potted flowers after being moved indoors also requires care. Flowers such as orange jasmine, Chinese hibiscus, jasmine, azalea, cyclamen, poinsettia, clivia, and Christmas cactus should be placed in a sunny spot so they receive sufficient light, allowing the leaves to carry out photosynthesis better and store nutrients to safely overwinter.
If you not only enjoy growing flowers but also want to experience the pleasure of propagating them yourself, you need to prepare in autumn. Autumn is the season when the seeds of herbaceous flowers mature, so seed collection and storage should be done in a timely manner. When collecting seeds, choose mother plants that are robust and excellent in both flower color and flower shape. When storing, be sure to dry them and wrap them well, and place them in a ventilated, dry, low-temperature (0°C-4°C) environment. For some flowers, such as canna, dahlia, dwarf dahlia, and hosta, the aboveground stems and leaves can be cut off before Frost's Descent, the rhizomes dug out, the old soil removed, and after drying for one to two days, placed in a pot for sand storage, keeping the old roots to preserve the variety. There are also some flowering plants, such as bottle gourd, loofah, and marvel-of-Peru, whose seeds have already matured in autumn. At this time, seeds should be collected and preserved for sowing the following year. For herbaceous flowers such as pansy, cineraria, and hollyhock, early September to early October is the best sowing time. After sowing, attention should be paid to spraying water to keep them moist, and after seedlings emerge, thinning should be done in a timely manner. For flowers such as Chinese rose, jasmine, tree peony, Milan aglaia, Chinese peony, honeysuckle, magnolia, and golden osmanthus, cutting, division, layering, and grafting are also best done from September to October.
As the weather gradually turns cooler and sunlight weakens, the growth of potted flowers slows down. Except for a few flowers that bloom around spring, such as Christmas cactus, camellia, winter jasmine, azalea, and cyclamen, which can be cared for normally, most flowers should have their watering controlled starting in mid-September, and fertilization should be stopped, so as to avoid root rot from excessive water and rampant growth of branches and leaves, which would affect overwintering. Watering also differs among different flowers and plants. For wintersweet, camellia, and plum blossom, which bloom in winter and early spring, watering should be controlled and misting increased to help the formation of flower buds. For rubber plant, Brazil wood, money tree, camellia, and sasanqua camellia placed in the living room, watering should also be controlled, reducing both the frequency and amount of watering, to promote the lignification of new shoots of woody plants so they can overwinter safely. For potted foliage plants moved indoors, such as Swiss cheese plant, heartleaf philodendron, cordyline, pothos, and maranta, misting should be the main method and watering supplementary, with the goal that the potting soil not be dry. For flowering plants such as clivia, calla lily, cymbidium, and bromeliad, a liquid fertilizer mixed with 0.2% monopotassium phosphate and 0.1% urea can be sprayed. For Milan aglaia, chloranthus, and jasmine, a thin phosphorus-potassium fertilizer can also be applied once to help them overwinter smoothly. For most foliage plants, nitrogen fertilizer should be stopped, and some low-concentration potassium fertilizer should be appropriately applied to increase the cold resistance of the flowers.
After the beginning of autumn, when the temperature is around 20°C, most flowers tend to sprout many tender branches. Apart from retaining some tender branches as needed, the rest should be pruned away in a timely manner to reduce unnecessary nutrient consumption. For bonsai and potted flowers moved indoors, dead branches, pest- and disease-damaged branches, overly dense branches, and weak branches should be thinned out. For leggy branches (growth branches that grew too vigorously in the current year), heavy shortening pruning can be carried out. For bonsai that have been trained for 1 to 2 years, the binding material can be removed, or removed and then rebound, to prevent long-term binding at fixed positions from injuring the cambium of the branches and causing the branches and leaves to wither and die. For some other flowers, the retained tender branches should also be pinched in a timely manner. For flowers such as chrysanthemum, dahlia, jasmine, and Chinese rose, when the flower buds grow to a certain size, apart from retaining one well-growing large bud at the top, the remaining side buds should all be removed.
Autumn is also the final egg-laying period for various flower and tree pests, making it a good time for pest and disease control. We can seize the time before potted flowers are moved indoors to carry out pest and disease control. First, manual capture; second, washing with water. If urea and washing powder are mixed with water and sprayed, the control effect is relatively good. Common diseases include leaf spot disease and rot disease of branches and trunks, among others. Corresponding removal should be carried out before they are moved indoors, so they do not continue to harm the potted flowers after being brought inside.