Can these 2 year olds stay outside yet?

[Dave_E]

Hi All,

These 2 year olds have been in the house for their first 2 winters, outside during the summer. Problem is, when I bring them back in, I bring back in gnats with them and we fight gnats all winter long. Are they old enough to leave outside? I live in western Washington. I do have a green house but it is not heated. Added a picture of a palm I planted 4 years ago… it was in a 4 or 5 gallon pail from Lowe’s.

Dave

[Trustandi]

Hi @Dave_E! 

Welcome to Palmtalk. I think it should be ok to leave them outside on the drier side in the winter. Our winter is quite mild. Unless, we get the artic blast, below freezing temperature for several hours or more. Then you should move them to your unheated greenhouse or garage. 

[BeyondTheGarden]

I second that motion.  I dislike gnats, especially indoors.  Peroxide sprayed topically on the soil seems to reduce gnats.  Keeping the pots on the dry side also seems to reduce gnats.  

I had probably 60-80 T fortunei seedlings in 1 gal and smaller pots outside all winter this year, and only lost a small percentage.  And many of those were probably not from freezing but from the small pots getting knocked over and not getting watered this spring.  

Nice hardiboard, I wish homes on the east coast would switch to that, instead of this cheesy vinyl siding.  

[RFun]

They should be fine unless you get some kind of strange arctic air invasion.