How to acclimate plants to sun and cold

How many times have we bought a plant and as soon as we got to the garden or patio we put it directly in the sun? I recognize that not one, many, especially when the new acquisitions have been cacti or succulent. If this is done in spring, when the sun’s rays are not yet very strong, nothing usually happens, but if it is done in summer… the next day we will find our new plants quite bad.

To prevent this from happening to you, we will explain step by step how to acclimate plants to the sun and cold.

potted succulents

Index

  • 1 Adapt them to the sun
  • 2 Adapt them to the cold

Adapt them to the sun

Heliophilous plants , that is, those that grow exposed to the sun, such as cacti, many succulents, seasonal flowers, most trees and shrubs (olive, cherry, mastic, carob, cycads, among others), and many palm trees ( Phoenix, Sabal, Livistona, among others), when they are grown in nurseries, they are usually in what we could call semi-shade. They are often grown in greenhouses, where the sun does not reach them directly, and when they are taken outside they are placed in corners protected from the sun.

To do? Buy them in the spring. And although we know that they must be exposed to the sun, it is best to place them in an area where they get direct sunlight for one or two hours in the morning when it dawns or in the afternoon when it gets dark. We will have them there for two-three weeks, until we see them grow. From the third or fourth week we can give them one or two more hours of direct sunlight, and increase the number of hours as the weeks go by at a rate of 1-2 hours every seven days.

Adapt them to the cold

This costs a bit more, but it’s not impossible . If we have recently acquired plants, and even if they are resistant to cold, we have to protect them, at least during the first year, otherwise they could have a bad time and could even perish. To do this, in autumn-winter you have to:

  • Padding them : you can use bark, herbs, decorative stones…
  • Protect them with a thermal blanket : if they are a bit on the edge, you have to cover them with a thermal blanket for plants.
  • Put them in a greenhouse : if they are very sensitive to cold, there will be no choice but to put them inside a greenhouse.
  • Fertilize them : well, it’s more about giving them a spoonful of Nitrofoska once a month so that their roots don’t get cold. It works.

Those that you know can withstand the climate of your area well, the following year you will not need to protect them. To know this, it is highly recommended to get a weather station .

plant in clay pot

I hope that these tips will help you so that your plants are acclimatized to the cold and the sun.

How to acclimate plants to sun and cold

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