Mary sounds as tho you plan to keep it growing in the house.. If so you can dig it up cut the root ball back place it is a sunny spot and enjoy it for the Winter.. No real need to cut it back if you don't want to.. OR are you planning it to go dormant? Sorry to be so vague.. But if you only have the one to care for and a place to put it you could get a good flush over the Winter if you keep it actively growing..

Kylie

I want to do what is the best for the plant, to keep it healthy and thriving. If that means it needs a dormant period for the winter I will do that. But I am not sure how to do this. I am a zone 5 so it will have to be in the house regardless if it goes dormant or not. I will have to cut it back to bring it in, it is too big otherwise. But I am not sure how far to cut it back or were to cut. Also do I cut it back while it is still outside in the ground or wait till I bring it inside to pot up?

Mary

If you are going to cut it back I would do it outside just to make it it easy on your self .. you can always root the cuttings so you will have more plants or share them with friends.. I wouldn't cut it back below a Y becoz the plant would have to start over to produce blooms.. IMHO I would pot it up stick it a sunny location and just Enjoy!!!! Water when necessary lighten up a bit on the fert. and get a good head start on the season next yr...

Kylie

Kylie thank you very much for all your help!
Can I just put it in miracle grow potting soil or do I need somthing else?

mary

Mary, I too am in Zone 5 and have found that trying to keep them growing indoors over the winter is not always the best thing to do. Even if you have it beside a south facing patio door getting lots of light, our sun in this zone is not strong enough to promote anything but weak, lanky growth.
If you have a basement that sits between 50-65 degrees I would trim it up the way Kylie said but then try to have it go dormant in that basement.
If you do keep it growing, it will lose all the leaves it put out inside anyway as soon as it goes outdoors plus you are more likely to have a White Fly. Aphid or Spider Mite infestation if kept growing. Be sure, no mater how you decide to over winter it, that you give it 2 good doses of insecticidal soap, 10 days apart, to try and curtail any hitchhikers into the house on the plant.
However much you trim it back at the top, you want to reduce the root size correspondingly. I.E. if you cut it back by 50% on top you can cut the roots back by the same 50%. ( I do it far more but I have done this for over 13 years).
If you want to really prune it back hard, here is a link to a tutorial I have shared with other Brug growers.....

Here is a link that might be useful: Bringing in a Brugmansia for Dormancy

Excellent job on the tutorial Ruth Ann!!!!

Kylie

Ruth ann that is wonderful, thank you so much for the help..what a great tutorial.

MaRY

I agree, that is a spectacular tutorial. I know it's information I will certainly require eventually. :) Thank you for sharing it Ruth Ann :)

~Tina

So many things depend on so many variables but the important thing to know about these plants is that they are incredibly hard to kill; you might stunt it but you have lots of room to experiment.

At the moment I live in a 1 bedroom apartment in the city with no yard. I have a large window that faces West. I grow a brugmansia in a pot and it has been here for over a year, growing happily year-round (we have dry, sunny winters here so that helps with light). Indoors the flowers are fewer - 2-8 at a time - but seem to be bigger and last longer, and the scent is amazing. I also kept a brugmansia in a house with a West-facing window in college a couple years ago; my roommates were quite messy so had no standing to complain about my large plant. I root cuttings all the time, and have never lost one.

I usually don't prune roots. Once I randomly stabbed a kitchen knife into the pot a few times and surely severed some, which did seem to trigger a new flush of leaves, but it isn't necessary. I do, however, like to lift it out of its pot (the rootball is extremely dense so it slides out with no mess) and stuff fallen leaves into the pot under it. That feeds some yellow mushrooms which are sort of interesting. Within a week the dead leaves are fused into the roots.

However it isn't an ideal "houseplant," it's definitely jungle-looking thing and it can shed a lot of leaves, and the branches quickly turn towards the window.

I also get horrible spider mite infestations, and sometimes whiteflies; I might leave for a weekend and come back to find it covered, and most leaves dropping off. I spray it with neem oil or pyrethrin (pyrethrin can stunt the young leaves though) following the directions on the bottle, and with a heavy dose of fertilizer it flushes out with new leaves and blooms in about a month. Its easier to eradicate the mites when leaves are gone.

In a cool garage (I don't have one but can use my parents' house), a brug will go completely dormant. In a warmer room it will be able to survive in near-dormancy for a winter if there is a small amount of light but will look unsightly with few, small leaves.

The one thing to remember is that if you think it's dead, it probably isn't. You can hack brugmansias to bits and each tiny piece will be able to re-grow. Pruning is also easy because if you leave at least one "Y," that one still produces flowers and you can remove all others.