Boxwood - indoors or not indoors?

[DougB]

Sterling355 please let me give you 2 pieces of advise. 1st update your profile to include your location, and not just a state but more specific. Trees and plants are dependent upon specific climates, hence much of the advise provided is governed by the species and location. Secondly, find a club in your area. There you will find the real "pros" for your area, and with rare exception they are more than willing to help newcomers. And welcome.

 

[michaelj]

Please refrain from saying that somebody can't do something ever in life. I've heard people say all my life "you can't do this, he/she can't do that" as blanket statements and it is beyond ignorant to almost insulting if that were enough to discourage people from ever trying. If people gave up because "John Doe" said you can't do it, we would still think the world is flat. ... This year I'm also expecting my first born child with my wife that people said I could never date because I had no chance with her.

The advice people are giving here is a lot less like telling you not to ask out that hot babe who became your wife, and a lot more like telling you not to abuse her, lest she lose interest in you.

 

[Sterling355]

You are about the 100th person to come to BonsaiNut in the last decade who thinks they can do this

I know, I see countless threads of people doing the same thing over and over. They all ask what happened to my juniper because it looks sick, everyone asks for pictures, they then post pictures and the tree is all brown or partly green and brown and sitting inside, then members chime in "indoors is bad, your tree is dead", then some jokes will be tossed around at the expense of the poster while others may offer some kind words, then the poster goes in to denial saying "but there is still some green left. I'm going to try to put it outside and bring it back", certain posters say "give up, its been dead weeks ago", then the poster slowly realizes that they are wrong and killed their first tree. Instead of accepting the fact that they were wrong and some people who threw out little jabs at the expense of their misfortune were in fact right, they silently vanish into the internet void to never be heard from again and to never try again. This happens a lot around Christmas time.

I've read these forums, and other forums like this one as well, for a very long time now. I like to observe something before getting involved. On these forums and the other ones, I know who responds with more abrasive-like responses and who usually posts with more insight, support or condolences.

I knew this thread would generate a mix of both.


I've been working on a design now for 6 months, mainly a lot of brainstorming and sketches of this design as I play it out in my mind how I think it will function. I'm slowly putting all the pieces together but its going to be some time I'm sure before I get it just right. I have kept plants indoors in the past and was successful in not only keeping them alive but getting them to flourish to the point that they became almost destructive. I need a better understanding of these trees however for me to dive into this in the way I hope to. Am I going to fail? Yup I'm 100% sure that I will. I just hope that I don't fail to keep trying and learning from my mistakes. Sure I have my doubts whether I can pull this off and I would love to share what I find with everyone. Who knows what could happen because I have my flaws just like anybody else.
Would this whole journey be accepted by the community whether it fails or succeeds? Or am I just going to be labeled and ridiculed as another one of those 100 "juniper killers" gathering a lot of fire wood? Who knows, we shall see but I do appreciate everyone's responses thus far. All of them help me paint a bigger picture of understanding.

I do have one question though, what humidity levels are desired for these trees? Is anything above 70% harmful? Is 50% desirable? When does low levels of humidity start to hinder the tree rather than nourish it and what would this low number be?

Anyways, thank you all for the tips and advice for winter care and storage with a boxwood. Some things have been said here that you can't find on a generic or basic care guide. These advanced tips and first-hand experiences are things that I think help more than anything else. I'm sure somebody just starting out and thinking you can just place an outdoor tree in their window will come across this thread without ever even introducing themselves or posting a word. They will take this information and utilize it towards keeping their own tree healthy and strong and who knows how involved they will get in the hobby later down the road.

 

[DougB]

Sterling good luck to you in you quest. Please keep us informed with both pics and words (you express yourself well).

 

[JudyB]

I will jump in here, not to sway anyones opinions about the issue, but just to throw in my experiences with indoors in the winter.
I have a kingsville boxwood, a brazilian rain tree, a willow leaf ficus, and an olive that overwinter in my house. All have overwintered in this manner for 3 years at least, the rain tree and ficus for much longer. When the weather warms up all those trees go outside for the summer.
I have not had any issues, nor do I go to great lengths to give them a greenhouse environment. The boxwood lives near a west window, the others live in a south exposure window, that also have regular shop light florescent fixtures above them. I have also kept the rain tree the ficus and the olive on seedling heat mats, to keep the roots nice and cozy. I have experienced great growth on both the olive and raintree during the winter months with this easy setup. I don't do any extra humidity, but none of the above trees are really trees that need high humidity. And the olive wouldn't really like a lot of humidity anyway.

I am extremely careful about watering these trees. I keep wooden skewers in them, and only water when they need it. I would also tell you that I don't think that I would be successful with this if I were to keep them indoors year round without a more intensive and expensive setup.

Of all of these trees, I have considered keeping the boxwood out in my cold greenhouse storage, as I know it would be fine there. It's been a personal decision to keep it inside, and one I may not continue if the plant shows any sign of decline. The other 3 trees will continue to come in for the winter. I would only say that it is possible to do things like this, but having the experience of first keeping bonsai healthy in a normal (outdoor) situation will go a long way towards a successful project instead of a failure. Good luck and keep us posted.

 

[devenomized]

I will jump in here, not to sway anyones opinions about the issue, but just to throw in my experiences with indoors in the winter.
I have a kingsville boxwood, a brazilian rain tree, a willow leaf ficus, and an olive that overwinter in my house. All have overwintered in this manner for 3 years at least, the rain tree and ficus for much longer. When the weather warms up all those trees go outside for the summer.
I have not had any issues, nor do I go to great lengths to give them a greenhouse environment. The boxwood lives near a west window, the others live in a south exposure window, that also have regular shop light florescent fixtures above them. I have also kept the rain tree the ficus and the olive on seedling heat mats, to keep the roots nice and cozy. I have experienced great growth on both the olive and raintree during the winter months with this easy setup. I don't do any extra humidity, but none of the above trees are really trees that need high humidity. And the olive wouldn't really like a lot of humidity anyway.

I am extremely careful about watering these trees. I keep wooden skewers in them, and only water when they need it. I would also tell you that I don't think that I would be successful with this if I were to keep them indoors year round without a more intensive and expensive setup.

Of all of these trees, I have considered keeping the boxwood out in my cold greenhouse storage, as I know it would be fine there. It's been a personal decision to keep it inside, and one I may not continue if the plant shows any sign of decline. The other 3 trees will continue to come in for the winter. I would only say that it is possible to do things like this, but having the experience of first keeping bonsai healthy in a normal (outdoor) situation will go a long way towards a successful project instead of a failure. Good luck and keep us posted.

I have a boxwood indoors and I will be bringing it home next week. It is not dying, but I've been reading a lot about the pros/cons and I do not have the time to make sure the tree survives in my office even though I have humidifiers, lights, fans, and a large window. The willow leaf ficus are a different story. Those are doing and look great. I want my boxwood to continue to look the way it does and I don't want to realize it needs to be outdoors when it is too late.

just my .02 and no... i'm not a bonsai expert at all.

 

[Sterling355]

Hey guys, sorry I haven't posted in a while. I have a lot going on lately so please forgive my absence. I want to share my experiences here involving these trees indoor with everyone, good and bad.

I have pictures that I need to upload when I get a chance so everyone can see what I have going on. I have since then purchased a large humidifier meant for a large room and placed this near my set up. I have the humidifier set at 50% humidity. The humidifier runs and shuts off as if it is reading at 50% humidity, but my digital meter in my set up only reads 28% - 30% humidity so one of these instruments is off or I'm missing something.

I also have documented moisture readings that I take either every day, or every other day, as well as documented notes detailing any changes in appearance, discolored foliage, dead foliage, new growth, and budding. Once I gather more data and I'm going to design some nice graphs showing what is going on and where the trees are going, whether they are just maintaining, increasing in health, or declining. I'm thinking about maybe purchasing a scale to weigh the trees as well. I'm using the trees that I keep outside as subjects to compare to the ones I have inside.

Boxwood - So far the boxwood has been doing amazing. When it first came in months ago it had just a very few select leaves that were discolored (red tips). Since I haven't had any discoloration since then, I'm going to guess that this would be sun damage prior to the tree coming into my possession. Please correct me if I'm wrong however in this. If it was root damage I would suspect that it would have spread out by now, but the opposite has happened. To date the tree has really shot out some impressive growth and lots of budding. It seems to be a very healthy green coloration and drinks well.

Juniper(s) - I have 2 junipers inside under these lights, and 6 outside (shimpaku and proc nana). So far the junipers I have inside have been doing way better than I expected. One I got in had some damaged foliage from shipping but has been coming around nicely with some decent buds emerging. The other juniper I have had inside now for over 5 months and it has been doing extremely well with nice foliage and lots of budding on the trunk and branches. I have pictures of this as well.

Ficus - I have a ficus under these lights as well and that seems to be doing great, which I expected though however so I don't have much to say about this since ficus is already known to do well indoors. If anything I caught myself not watering it enough and was tending to it the same way I would with the junipers and boxwood. Needless to say it appeared wilted a few times.

Fukien Tea - Same thing as above with the ficus. Again caught myself having the fukien tea on the same watering pattern as the junipers and boxwood. At one point I thought this tree was gone since the tree dropped about 95% of its leaves. Now the tree is back to full health with some great budding, nice full green foliage, and flowers. I never moved it from the indoor location either.

So that is where I stand currently and will keep monitoring all of this. I really think that with today's technology, certain parameters can be met allowing people to keep these trees inside that otherwise couldn't in the past. I'm also starting to see why the author of that article I posted earlier in this thread mentioned that he strongly believes the main reason people have dead junipers inside is because they over water them. I purchased a light meter as well as a moisture meter. These instruments have greatly helped me better understand, or at least point me in the right direction, what kind of set up is needed to maintain these trees inside. Digital-reading meters tend to be what I like more.

For light I've been aiming for 1200 and 2000 light readings. I purchased my light fixtures and bulbs from Todd Goode at http://www.lightyourreptiles.com/. He has been extremely helpful, top notch support, and has grown some impressive trees himself indoors with the lights he has for sale.

For moisture levels I tend to water the Boxwood whenever it drops below an average reading of 4.0. Really though I like to water it more when it gets closer to 1.5 or below. I then water it with a mixture of 1/4 teaspoon of SuperThrive per gallon of distilled water and 1/4 teaspoon of Bonsai Pro 7-9-5 Fertilizer per gallon of distilled water.

For moisture levels of the Junipers I tend to water them with the same mixture mentioned above. I water them when their moisture readings read 0.0 and I take 4 readings per tree to make sure the soil is dry in a "north, west, south, east" locations around the plant so I know there are no pockets holding in moisture. The constant probing puts air in the soil as well.

If anybody has any questions, comments, or concerns then please feel free to share with me. Also if you see any errors in my set up or environmental parameters then please let me know so I can make those corrections.

 

[M. Frary]

Never considered having a weigh in. My money is on the wettest one.

 

[Sterling355]

Never considered having a weigh in. My money is on the wettest one.

haha yea I guess I should have mentioned I would do this when the moisture readings are at 0.0, but again this has just been a thought because it could be totally off and not sure if it would be accurate enough to even help me.

 

[glitch1969]

I have been trying out growing japanese boxwoods purely inside. the best advice on this post so far is fluffy mold and a fan. i cut all the branches off my boxwood except one small stem per large trunk branch it has been budding back nicely. my son even saw yhe pruning and said " it looks like a tree that looks like it lost its dignity" if that tells the story. i will try to post a pic of my set up . i have had these for six months and i have to prune every two months with the others as they are growing fast for a dloe growing hedge.

 

[glitch1969]

I want to start off by saying i didnt mean to sound so curt about all the posts on here. There was alot of good questions and good info. I do have to ask how are your indoor boxwood project coming along i see its been a year. my phone will let me post but runs out of memmory to post my pics. I am very interested in hearing an update. I believe it can be done. mine are thriving so far. any input on the lights im using...they are 7000 kelven at 9 watts. Im not looking to flower my japanese boxwoods so would i need a diferent spectrum?

 

[Cypress187]

I can't even grow a boxwood outside

 

[M. Frary]

I will jump in here, not to sway anyones opinions about the issue, but just to throw in my experiences with indoors in the winter.
I have a kingsville boxwood, a brazilian rain tree, a willow leaf ficus, and an olive that overwinter in my house. All have overwintered in this manner for 3 years at least, the rain tree and ficus for much longer. When the weather warms up all those trees go outside for the summer.
I have not had any issues, nor do I go to great lengths to give them a greenhouse environment. The boxwood lives near a west window, the others live in a south exposure window, that also have regular shop light florescent fixtures above them. I have also kept the rain tree the ficus and the olive on seedling heat mats, to keep the roots nice and cozy. I have experienced great growth on both the olive and raintree during the winter months with this easy setup. I don't do any extra humidity, but none of the above trees are really trees that need high humidity. And the olive wouldn't really like a lot of humidity anyway.

I am extremely careful about watering these trees. I keep wooden skewers in them, and only water when they need it. I would also tell you that I don't think that I would be successful with this if I were to keep them indoors year round without a more intensive and expensive setup.

Of all of these trees, I have considered keeping the boxwood out in my cold greenhouse storage, as I know it would be fine there. It's been a personal decision to keep it inside, and one I may not continue if the plant shows any sign of decline. The other 3 trees will continue to come in for the winter. I would only say that it is possible to do things like this, but having the experience of first keeping bonsai healthy in a normal (outdoor) situation will go a long way towards a successful project instead of a failure. Good luck and keep us posted.

Overwintered my Kingsville inside this year. There will never a next winter for that one. Maybe dryness? It lasted a whole 2 months. Never again.

 

[glitch1969]

i have humidity trays under mine with lave rock in it. This rock seems to wick moisture better and the heat from my bottom lamps help. I have a warming pad i have considered putting under the lower tray but for now i rotate my plant from the top shelf to the bottom. I like the fact that this keeps me involved with my plants. No timer on the lights either. If i were to set one i would forget them...lol.

 

[Judge]

I only have 2 boxwood they are outside all year , no cover just out of the wind. The temps last two years were -15 to -20 F for weeks on end and there was no damage, except the 3 feet of snow on them. When the snow was melting it did break a few small twigs off.
These were in my garden for 30 years , before I dug them out last year with the same weather , I believe the lowest temps were -25 F and no snow they are tough trees I would not worry about the cold if I were you.

 

[glitch1969]

ok. so i put a fan in my boxwoods and it dried out my leaves. took the fan away and we will see if my dignity tree survives. all is well with the others. my starts are taking forever to root. with rooting hormone even? they are very green though.

 

[rockm]

I have a couple of kingsville boxwoods. They all stay outdoors all year. Pretty sure the temps got into the low twentysF this year, and all of them are beautifully green and healthy. Keep the wind off them, let the weather water them, keep the sun away and let em sleep from Thanksgiving til St. Patrick's day. I repotted this one last month and the root system was amazing. I wont mess with success. I also like the break from maintenance for a while.

The answer to your question is "No" Kingsville will survive winters indoors, but it weaken them and can kill them outright if they're put in the wrong location. Been there, done it.
I keep all of my Kingsville mulched into beds in the backyard. Have for years after initially trying to keep them indoors in winter.
If you repotted one LAST MONTH??? then you have complicated the tree's ability to survive in the harsh indoor environment. Heating systems dry winter air out to below desert levels of humidity. Your boxwood needs humidity to keep from losing leaves. It may not be able to keep up with the dry air and could drop foliage and limbs.

If this were mine I'd keep it outside under mulch...BTW, lack of sunlight will also weaken the plant -- boxwood are evergreen, which means they're sporadically active in winter. They need light, or at least some light in winter.

 

[jeanluc83]

Instead of accepting the fact that they were wrong and some people who threw out little jabs at the expense of their misfortune were in fact right, they silently vanish into the internet void to never be heard from again and to never try again.

I just thought this was an interesting quote from someone who only had 16 posts and hasn't been here since 2014.

 

[Bonsai Nut]

Boxwoods grow poorly here in Southern California, though I am almost positive it is more due to our clay soil and alkaline water than anything else. Boxwoods like slightly acidic soil, so when our water out of the tap is 8.0 pH, and they require irrigation in order to survive, it doesn't take long for them to fade. Doesn't stop the big box nursery stores from selling them, however

They go dormant here in the winter in landscape. We rarely get weather in the 30's, but they will still be dormant even when the weather is not freezing.

 

[It's Kev]

I had a boxwood, put it outside like everyone said, and nurtured that thing to death...