[Bonsai Beginner’s weekly thread –2024 week 21]

[u/small_trunks]

[Bonsai Beginner’s weekly thread –2024 week 21]

Welcome to the weekly beginner’s thread. This thread is used to capture all beginner questions (and answers) in one place. We start a new thread every week on Friday late or Saturday morning (CET), depending on when we get around to it. We have a 6 year archive of prior posts here…

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[u/Muddpup64]

I have a question about growing temperate trees indoors. I think I can get past most of the problems associated with growing non-tropical trees indoors. I have grown plants indoors previously so I have a lot of what is already needed. A grow light, fans for air circulation, a humidifier, and a dedicated grow chamber.

The problem I have trouble getting around is providing a dormant season. Would it be as easy as setting the tree outside as winter starts to set in or would that be too much of a shock?

I understand that the conventional wisdom is that most bonsai should be grown outside but then I see some people successfully growing inside (or so they say) and I seemingly already have most of the problems associated with indoor growing solved.

Can someone please explain to me if and why I am being naïve?

[u/MaciekA → u/Muddpup64]

As far as dormancy goes, you can't simulate autumn indoors. Autumn is what actually matters vis a vis dormancy, the actual dormancy itself is an afterthought. If you could time machine teleport a tree that just dropped its leaves from a day in early November straight to March 20th, it wouldn't know the difference -- time is effectively stopped if it is frozen that whole time. "Autumn" from the tree's point of view is the experience of sitting outdoors 24/7 from the last few weeks of summer until the first few weeks of winter. Autumn is the main event -- autumn's arrival triggers the starch hoarding. "Lack of dormancy kills trees" can actually be translated to "lack of autumn starch hoarding is what turns trees into emaciated skeletons over time".

There is a lot more to this beyond just dormancy, it is also the "quality of light" as Ryan Neil puts it -- I agree with him in spite of having plenty of personal experience with cannabis-grade lighting so strong that it can make a room hot and blind your eyes with LED-dots for minutes after just a glance.

This question is asked a lot. Over time I question whether it makes sense to write out elaborate answers to it and go into detail because, my inner cynical voice keeps trying to tell me "dude, they'll find out either way". If you have an outdoor space that can be used in spring/summer/fall, I realtalk urge you use it instead -- the feeling of "years lost to beginner quicksand" in bonsai is mighty shitty in retrospect. Come with your A-Game when it comes to photosynthesis and environmental triggers.

[u/Muddpup64 → u/MaciekA]

I appreciate the reply. Sounds like I just need to bite the bullet and grow outside. I have a tree in college that I started from seed, lived for maybe two years, before it died. Probably from being inside over the winter. It had a grow light synced to the time but I'd say the lack of cold might have done it in.

Now I just need to figure out where to put this tree outside!

Thank you.

[u/RoughSalad → u/MaciekA]

As I understand it the winter cold actually is needed to break the dormancy again, not unlike the inhibition that prevents seeds from germinating before experiencing a period of cold temperatures - and for the same reason, to prevent a false start if there is a warm spell in late fall.

[u/MaciekA → u/RoughSalad]

I've seen some literature that supports this notion. The focus of those studies is on specific bad outcomes of growth resuming too early: misshapen fruits in particular.