Moving House - care of container plants

Lyn Plant-Wells

Hi folks. I will be moving from Bournemouth to the 'island' in a few weeks. I have various pots - large/med/small going with me. One is an Acer in a large pot. I has grown well from a tiny plant and tallest stem is about 5'. I did trim it a little some months ago (it did not bleed) but the stems are very thin and I'm worried about it getting damaged by the movers. Can I prune it so easier to transport? I understand they don't like being waterlogged (been very wet the past week or so) but I don't have a greenhouse or garage at the new place. 

I also have a very small Wisteria, given to me from a cutting. It's leaves are now dropping/yellow and I'm wondering if it's a waste of time as I think they take years to grow. I brought it back from France in May and it's only grown a tiny bit.

I have grown lots of Pelargoniums - in the past couple of weeks (until it started raining) they were all looking better than ever. I would really like to take them as some are unusual colours - also from France. Should I cut them back? Some are quite big but several in one 'nursery' pot.

Lastly, I have a beautiful pale pink low growing rose - don't know the name but since it started raining it went mad with many blooms (more than I have ever seen before.) I would like to take cuttings. Any advice?

Apologies for length of this post!

Rubytoo

I would ask the movers about your acer, if they are professionals they will be used to moving such things. They may have special packaging or tell you how best to protect it so it does not get damaged by them.
Your geraniums should be fine cut back.
Not sure about the rose. If it means a lot to you ask buyers if they mind you taking it. Dug up and cut back it would survive. Nearly the time to buy bare root roses from rose suppliers so it would probably be okay. Cuttings in a pot if you could keep it damp and undisturbed. I sometimes use a long tom for the odd one, like a clematis pot.
Actually your acer stems look soft. A tube made of a cardboard box with the stems carefully gathered in a bit might work, only you know how pliable they are.
A slightly flared shape not a close vertical tube. Check packaging companies that sell boxes or see if a local garden center or nursery has something that would fit, they often give away boxes at checkout, so may be happy to help, you could phone first and explain.
Good Luck with your move.

treehugger80

last time i moved an Acer in a pot i pushed four bamboo canes all the way to the bottom of the pot (they have to be taller than the tree when installed) then i wrapped it all up in cling film, making sure to fold any branches up carefully. i can imagine this would work for most plants in pots

Lyn Plant-Wells

Hi Thanks for the advice. Do you think the Acer could be pruned a bit? The branches are very thin. It has grown a lot since I took some tips off a few months ago.

Obelixx

Japanese maples don't really respond well to pruning.  Just ask the movers to be careful with it.  We moved 2 years ago and had a lorry trailer full of plants in pots of all sizes including 6' high ficus benjamina and elastica and loads of roses, clematis etc plus assorted shrubs, cuttings and houseplants.   They all survived an 800km journey and 4 nights and days in the trailer cos we loaded up on Thursday and they left on Sunday evening cos of French restrictions on lorries on Sundays.

Big Blue Sky

If you really like that rose, you definitely should take it with you. In one of the most recent GW programs Monty showed how it's done and seemed confident enough that it should work.

From my own experience - I had to move a rose and asked here in forum if this would work at all. The advice was - yes, it normally does work, so I replanted my rose and it is doing absolutely great a year later.

Lyn Plant-Wells

Thanks very much everyone.