A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2004 Too much sun too quickly?

I recently put all my indoor plants outside on the patio so they could get better light, fresh air, stuff like that. My apartment doesn't get full sun in any window, just indirect light, and the patio gets full sun most of the day. I've done it before and they seemed to love it, but now some of them (diffenbachia, aloe, and kalanchoe) are looking a little faded or bleached out. I've been very careful watering and feeding these guys, so I don't think that's it. I can try the "diff" in partial sun, but don't aloe and kalanchoe require full sun? I vaguely remember reading something about gradually getting plants used to differences in light. Is there such a thing as light shock, and could that be what I've done?

The plants in question should have been slowly acclamatized ("harden off")to the new environment. Hardening off is a process of adapting a plant that has been grown in a greenhouse, indoors, or under protective shelter to full outdoor exposure. Usually, over a week or more, the plant is exposed to increasing intervals of time outdoors so that when it is planted (or set outdoors in the container) makes the transition with minimum of shock or stress.

Likewise, outdoor plants should be harden off when being brought indoors.

It's kinda like going to the beach for the first time in a year and being b*tt white...then staying out in the sun all day....you get fried!!!!
Next time slowly work them out there...my guess is the last time it was done on a somewhat cloudy, cooler spree giving the plants a chance to acclimate on their own as the weather changed. Only a guess

this is sort of related to this post so I figured I would add it on....I had the opposite problem, I put my plants out too early and my palms got cold and a lot of their leaves turned brown. I have a ponytail palm, a chinese palm, and a corn plant. Do I cut off the brown areas or do I just let the green push the brown ones out? They don't look very pretty right now because of the brown, but I can live with that for awhile if they will get better without a trim.

Iplayindirt- Your plants that have lived in much lower light conditions got a sunburn, the light outside is much more intense then they will recieve in the sunniest window in your house! If you must put them out for the summer start them in the shade for the first few week and slowly move them into the sun. You must also be prepared for the reverse to happen in the fall! your plants that have become beautiful and lush during the summer what brought back in will go through light depervation when the need to get used to the much lower light levels inside and will probible end up looking worse then when they went outside in the spring. The other problem that you may run into is bugs that will come back inside with them, even if you clean them well a few insects with no preditor inside to help you out with them can become an infestation in a very short time.

Hope that I didn't rain on you parade to hard, I just wanted to let you know that you might end up with more problems that you bargined for with you kindness to your plants!

EdU - There is no harm in trimming off discolored leaves that are unpleasant to look at. Whether or not you leave the brown leaves as is will have no effect on the plant.