ORIGINALLY POSTED ZONE 10; WE ARE ZONE 8/9, BUT I CANNOT CHANGE THE TITLE. SORRY!!!!! Hi all. You guys helped me out with some questions during the winter about what kind of acer palmatum to buy for my Japanese maple-smitten husband. We are in Brittany in France, which is supposedly zone 8/9. We are about 1.5 hours from the sea to the north, west, & south. Our balcony is on the third floor (2nd in French language), and faces westish. We get a lot of rain & wind, & afternoon/evening sun. These plants seem to have become popular in France, they were even featured at our grocery store this week (altho it was a scraggly dying bunch of sprouts!). We bought a "atropurpureum" at the garden store last weekend as it was the cheapest we could find with the largest red leaves (they mostly have green skinny ones). Figured we would try this first before getting fancy about it! Had our hearts set on a Bloodgood, but they were much larger & thus 60+ euros, while this one was under 6E. I know from searching thru the archives the the AP's do not do well inside. But I am wondering what to do in winter? Can I leave this on our balcony, or should I stick it in our unheated attic to avoid freezing? Can I leave it inside for a few months, near a window where it would get the most light? Also, I saw lots of comments about soil, but nobody mentioned pots. Does it matter whether we use a shallow or deep pot, plastic or ceramic or other? I just used a frost-proof ceramic pot I had for house plants, but maybe this isn't good. Finally, many comments about keeping the trees inside say that this is because they will not get enough light, yet the comments about keeping them outside say to put them in the shade. Should I be placing the pot in the shade on my balcony?? Does this mean that when it grows taller than the wall of the balcony I have to give it an umbrella or something?! [Attached is a photo, I know the plant is not supposed to be in a bowl, I just didn't get a bottom yet! You can see that the plant is at the end of the balcony, against our apartment, so the most out of the wind possible, & eventually shaded by the daisies on the balcony wall.] Thanks!!!
Hi Theodora, Your maple will overwinter just fine on the balcony. You don't need to worry about freezing, it will live so long as the roots stay around -15C which will never happen where you are. It will be happiest just left outside. Your frost proof ceramic pot is just fine. Just make sure the soil in it is very free-draining. Don't put a bottom on the pot to catch the water and keep the bottom roots wet. Maples don't like that at all. You shouldn't need to worry about sun in your location, not with the maple you have so far (or Bloodgood either for that matter.) Wind might be more problematic, give it what shelter you can. I hope this answers your questions, and good luck. -E
Thanks for the answers, Emery. My husband will be bummed out, since he wants to have the plant inside, but ... I have all this info here to convince him otherwise!
I'm afraid it's really a non-starter as a houseplant. However perhaps you can find an Abutilon he'll like. There are loads, and they do fine indoors. cheers, -E
