I’ve been running through the forum looking to find info on pruning and repoting tips for those who live in tropical counties ( I live in Malaysia, where its sunny all year around). Not too sure when to repot Junipers as we don’t have seasons. Also wondering if should i move my trees to a shaded area for certain period of the year to let the tree go dormant or the tree would do fine being in the sun all year long.
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What is the type or source of the juniper? Trees from temperate climates require dormancy to survive. For areas with mild winter temperatures, providing a natural winter dormancy can be difficult. It should be noted that all temperate woody plants require a dormant period where temperatures drop to less than 10C continually for a period of between 260 hours and 1000 hours (depending on individual species). If there are tropical junipers I have no idea what they require!
Training and working with plants that are indigenous to your climate zone is advised to make the process practical. We keep our valuable junipers and pines in a controlled temperature and humidity with artificial low light to ensure a controlled period of dormancy. This is not inexpensive. I am interested to learn if there is such a thing as a tropical juniper 
What we have here is mostly chinese juniper n procumbens sold in nurseries. Maybe i shud consider finding a spot where the tree gets partial sunlight…maybe even shade to cut down the sunlight…
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i’ve figured that Junipers act as how they would grow and go dormant from its native country…after domesticating it to local climate they still grow during growing season n shut down production during certain time of the year…the trick is to figure out when is a good time to repot/pinch prune…recently i did some wiring work and its been thickening up…will wait for the next 3 months n figure out next…
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Oh definitely, I live in Guatemala we have two native juniper varieties here, sadly they are both endangered but they do exist and I find Juniper fares quite well where I live, I have both a San Jose and a variegata as well as a couple of thujas, there are several kinds of pines that are tropical and native as well, in fact, in the tropics is where the most diversity of.pine species you can find.
Oh and the name of the junipers I’m mentioning are: Juniperus standleyi and Juniperus comitana
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Well I asked about this in a recent Q&A with Ryan and he was mentioning that instead of temperature ranges for establishing their metabolic activities in the tropics is more about day light length, yes it’s super stable as well, but there is a bit of a change in the amount of light, so.unless you’re right on the equator I’m sure you can acertain the phase the tree is at by looking closely at this, I guess the most important is to protect them with a shade screen when the summer heat hits its highest points. Anyway, I would.love to know.more about your experiences in the tropics as I’m also quite.close to the equator. Also, Ive been getti g really into the endemic varieties, it’s a bit different than the established Japanese form but it’s a world full of opportunities and quite free in form if I’m being honest.
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