Learn How to Pack Plants for Moving by Following Our Guide

In this post we explain how to pack plants for moving safely through good planning and good ideas, but ideally, ask a gardener for advice on larger or more delicate plants.

Plants are a very important part of our homes and workplaces, since they add color, renew the air and relax, and moving them during a move is something delicate after time of care and pampering. Plants are temperamental, and even in the best cases they can suffer from sudden changes in light, temperature, humidity, movement or other conditions.

Should We Take Our Plants with Us?

Before knowing how to transport plants, we must consider whether it is really safe to take them, especially if the transfer is very long or to a very different climate. There are certain extremely fragile plants, as well as flowers and shrubs and saplings, that may not survive a move or relocation.

If we know that someone is going to live or work in our current house or office and would like to conserve the plants, perhaps we should consider, for their health, leaving them where they are and making more people happy. One option may be to keep a cutting to plant it in the new place, and thus keep some of them. We can also give some of our plants to close people who take care of them.

If, on the contrary, we cannot leave them or they have a lot of sentimental value for us, then this guide will help us to do so. Of course, we must be prepared for many extra hours of care for their preparation, their transfer and their acclimatization to the new home.

Steps to Pack Plants for Moving Safely

Prepare the Plants

A few weeks before the move, it is advisable to remove the dead leaves and branches from our plants, and give them a good pruning, and a few days before the move we must remove dust, possible pests and weeds. The better we prepare them, the more likely they are to survive. If we are not sure how to do it correctly, it is best to consult a specialist or inform ourselves thoroughly in reputable books.

To make the plants less heavy in the transfer, the ideal is to remove them from the pots (especially if they weigh a lot like the terracotta ones) and put them in plastic pots (or homemade containers made with cut-out carafes, for example, if they are large enough rigid), several weeks before so that all the changes do not come together at the same time.

If we have the possibility, it is important to locate in the new home or office the places where we will place our plants, preferably in the same orientation and in the same type of place where they were previously.

Move the Plants

The plants should be the last thing we move to the new place (in a moving truck they should go, therefore, placed last). It’s not a bad idea to have basic gardening tools on hand so you can easily access them.

If possible, we should transport the plants in a temperature-controlled environment, such as an air-conditioned vehicle. If we go to a moving company and let them know, they will know how to transport plants with minimal risk, but we must bear in mind that not all moving companies accept transporting plants. Ideally, we do it.

Plants must travel hydrated. Cold and humidity and heat and dryness are bad combinations for our dear botanical companions, so if we move them in summer, we must water them on the day of the move and if we move them in winter, we must do it for the last time days before so that the same day of the move they have dry land.

Re-Arrange the Plants

Once the journey is completed, the plants must be the first to be unloaded, and we must place them in their pot and in a temporary place where their stress is as low as possible, without drafts, without direct sun, and with enough water, and they must stay there for several days to recover from the shock they have experienced.

When our plants have acclimatized to the new home, we can place them in the final place that we have chosen for each one of them, ideally in places similar to the place of origin as we explained at the beginning.

If we have been left with cuttings or have relocated entire shrubs or young trees, we must immediately replant them in the appropriate places in the new garden.