Over wintering pond plants, some of the common ones

[addy1]

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/2532/

My bog type plant, star grass I just keep in moist, non standing water, kitty litter. It did fine over winter. Kept in a sunny window location.
I would say the umbrella plants would do fine doing the same, but I have not tried to over winter umbrella plants.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Unbrella palms tend to get long and stringy when taken in house if lighting is not good. They can be treated like a house plant and placed in a puddle of water. If the plant is very large you may want to cut it back before bringing in. If you have it still in the pond, look close for clones, they grow from the seed heads that break and fall into pond upsidedown. I used to make lots of unbrella palms that way, quicker than seed, the broken stems with seed heads that fall into water quite often sprout "clones", if you try to plant the seeds, the seeds will sprout grassy stuff that won't look like a palm for quite a while. The clones look just like a miniature unbrella palm but grow from the broken bend stem and will grow roots that can be easy to replant and wintering a small fresh clump is easier than cutting off a big overgrown heavy unbrella palm that may take up too much space in house.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Cattails are cold zone plants, and they need to freese in order to produce catkins in the spring. Lots of zone 2 and 3 plants must freeze, or they tend to die off. Zone two and three water plants can be left in the pond to freeze or in a bucket with water and froze in that too. The only plants that I bring in is my Calla lillys. I like to freeze the tops off if the plant is too large and then bring into my greenhouse, they can also be placed in a puddle of water and treated as a house plant, or store the excess bulbs very dry in basement in a dormant state. If you store them wet in basement they will rot, just like the canna. I store canna and Calla bulbs dry in dry cedar or pine wood chips and then they don't rot.

 

[addy1]

Thanks colleen, good information!

 

[CountryEscape]

Thanks again everyone. This time I wrote down the directions for the separate plants, will put it with the plants when I bring them in. So far things are not scorched by the freeze we had couple of weeks ago, but I'm thinking it was a very light frost. I was gone that weekend, so no idea what the temps were. Just know down southern IL where I was, one guy said he had to scrape ice off of his windshield. But, looks like the elephant and ears and taro, either bring in live and keep alive with light and water, or let die off in a heavy frost, bring in the bulbs and dry them out really well, and store in a cool dry place. Thinking I'm going to try the latter this year, as last year they didn't grow (taro mainly) and almost died by spring.
And anyone that has umbrella palms they are bringing in, note Colleen's post above about getting the top of one that has leaned over and rerooted. I tried to pull my huge plant, and believe me, it has HUGE root system! Not going to bring that one in this year, unless I find a small start that I can bring in and put in the window or under lights.
Question: On plants like the umbrella palm that I'm going to let die in the bog, will that hurt the bog system, rotting roots, etc., or is it ok to leave it to rot? If not ok, I will pull the roots out and shake the pea gravel off of them.
I noticed that some of my bog plants (penny wart mainly) has grown such a root system that it was pushing up against the edge of the liner where it BARELY got to the rock ledge, and water was dripping over last week. Pushed the roots back, all was good again. I've had that happen a couple of times. Need to lower the overflow of the bog so that doesn't happen again. Spring project ...

 

[addy1]

When I pull plants out of the bog, so far have not worried about any left over roots. The rush makes a huge root system. When I pull it the roots tend to come up.

My taro which I kept in kitty litter in the sun room did fine, but I noticed the stuff that grew all winter was slower recovering once I stuck it outside, the dry roots took off and grew faster.

 

[CountryEscape]

Thanks for the tip about the taro, Addy. I also brought in my one and only black taro last winter, it lived, but did seem to take a very long time to get going again in the spring. Maybe because we had that very warm March (80's) and then colder April (60's) and then HOT summer. But, think I'm going to try to dry them off this winter and see how that works.

 

[Fishylove]

Good info guys! I learn more and more each day

 

[CountryEscape]

Thanks again for this post, Addy. I hopefully saved my tropical lilies! I had it in my head they needed to be dried off, but they are supposed to stay moist! Oops! The Miami Rose got pretty dry, but the other two I just brought in couple of days ago still had lots of moist kitty litter attached to them. I rinsed them all off, as your directions said, and trimmed the roots and then stored them in a plastic bag with a wet paper towel. Whew!

 

[addy1]

my tropicals are still in the pond, growing buds and leaves. One of these days need to do something with them.

 

[CountryEscape]

Yep, Addy, mine were doing the same, one of them was waning, but the other two were looking pretty good. I just didn't want to wait until there was ice. LOL And, that water was pretty darn cold when I reached in to grab those pots! Brrrrrr....

 

[callingcolleen1]

It is a good idea to let the plants that have bulbs, die back naturally, and then trim the tops off. If you trim the tops off too soon, when the plant is still green, you will drain the blub of energy, and you may find it slow to come back the next year and not perform as good.

If you have large sedges that you leave out in the pond, don't trim the tops off at all, rather pile the dying tops on top on the root, and this will protect the plant from winter better and will insulate the new shoots in very early spring. There is no reason to hack everything back when still green, and lots of plants will look good all winter as a dried grass arrangement in the pond. It is more natural to not hack everything and in the spring, the dead stuff will pull away from the plant easy, when plant is good and ready to release last years growth.

Some plants I will trim like the lillys and marsh merigold, but grasses and rushes still look good dried and blowing in the wind. The Yellow flag iris and large sweet flags, the tops should just be piled on top of the plant, as the plant stays green for a long while and the left over energy from the leaves will go back to the root for spring.

 

[callingcolleen1]

It is a good idea to let the plants that have bulbs, die back naturally, and then trim the tops off. If you trim the tops off too soon, when the plant is still green, you will drain the blub of energy, and you may find it slow to come back the next year and not perform as good.

If you have large sedges that you leave out in the pond, don't trim the tops off at all, rather pile the dying tops on top on the root, and this will protect the plant from winter better and will insulate the new shoots in very early spring. There is no reason to hack everything back when still green, and lots of plants will look good all winter as a dried grass arrangement in the pond. It is more natural to not hack everything and in the spring, the dead stuff will pull away from the plant easy, when plant is good and ready to release last years growth.

Some plants I will trim like the lillys and marsh merigold, but grasses and rushes still look good dried and blowing in the wind. The Yellow flag iris and large sweet flags, the tops should just be piled on top of the plant, as the plant stays green for a long while and the left over energy from the leaves will go back to the root for spring.

 

[callingcolleen1]

Ops, I double posted again!!! Those pictures were from just now, and you can see that the yellow fag iris still has some green left, even though it was minus 24 last week!!!

 

[CountryEscape]

Thanks for the good pointers, Colleen. I have not cut back any of my irises, and the umbrella palm continues to look very green and growing, even though we have had 20's the last few mornings. The Moses' Grass is getting brown, but it's not hardy, I'm pretty sure. In only cut back the cattails as they were all brown. I guess I figured it was better to get rid of them, as they were breaking off in the wind and would have made for more gunk getting into the skimmer.