It depends which species of conifer you have....moist are prone to root rot in pots if kept too moist.

lets start by where you are..

and specifically.. what you got ...

what is your native soil ...

and why wait .... what cha thinkin ????

please study the handout.. while we figure out the rest ....

ken

Here is a link that might be useful: link

Hi wbG,

You want to hold your plants in containersfor approximately a month during early fall, not a big problem. As you mentioned, keep the black pots out of the sun during the heat of the day. Dappled shade, or bright shade would be best so that the foliage receives some light.

As to how to water, you should water as needed and it is important not to give too much water. Don't water every day, only water as needed. You can use the dowel method (insert a wooden barbeque skewer into the bottom of the soil and check if it comes out clean/dry or wet/with soil sticking) to help you judge, since it's impossible to tell from the top of the soil, what's going on inside the pot. You'll probably find they need water less frequently than you expect. It's better to err on the side of too little water than too much. Of course, you don't want them to dry out either.

So long as you avoid drowning the roots or cooking the roots, it will be pretty easy to maintain them between now and Oct. Long-term container culture is a whole different story with many more considerations...

Alex

Long-term container culture is a whole different story with many more considerations...

But not all that difficult either :-) Due to space considerations, I grow ALL my conifers in containers......some have been in place for many years. Most - but not all - are dwarf selections. With the exception of only a single plant, I've not lost any.

Long term care of containerized conifers is really not all that different from the care required by any other permanent container planting - a good quality, very textural (barky) potting medium, attention to watering and knowing when and how to fertilizer and when to repot.

Keeping the plant in a container now through to October should be a piece of cake! Watering is really the only concern. One of the best ways of determining whether a nursery container needs watering is to lift the container, plant and all - a lightweight container needs water; a heavy container can be skipped at this go-round.

Thank you Alex. That's exactly the information I was looking for.
And thank you gardengal for the container weight tip. That and Alex's skewer method should make it very easy to track the watering.

Ken and smivies. I got 4 piceas - omorika, glauca, orientalis and abies - and a pinus strobus. I am going to make a separate post with pictures, and another post about site prep.
I am in North Central MD, and we have hard to dig in clay soil. But the planting area now has up to a foot of mulch from grinding the stumps of some massive pine trees 2 years ago. They did not decompose as we had hoped. So now we have to remove the mulch and fill the bed up. I think it will be better if I add a picture of the site for you guys.

About the staking, I went to Home Depot today and bought bamboo sticks like the nursery owner had suggested, and the only plant ties I found was a Velcro thingy. There were nylon strings, but those were labelled as vine guide type things, and they looked too thin. How do I stake though? Attach new stake to old one or insert new stakes into the nursery pots?
Oh, and Ken, I am waiting until October to get into the good planting time for my area, and as that was the time I was aiming for, my planting site is not prepared yet, though I admit it's getting late.
I can't access the forum from work, so sorry for the late reply to all of you.

In MD you can plant into Nov. or Dec. in most cases, sometimes later. It's not the ground freezing (which happens here only sporadically) that's typically what stops you after that, but the wet, mucky winter ground we typically have.

Of course, looking out at my dusty landscape, I'd love some muck right now.