The temperature that each plant can endure depends on its most sensitive part – the root. When plants are in a flower pot, they are protected by far less soils then in the ground. That’s why they are more sensitive towards low temperatures.
In any warmer place, flowers and plants can live through the winter by just being covered with a heat insulating material, in the corner of the garden. However, in colder places, plants and especially flowers need to be placed inside. Many of them that change leaves can endure winter in a darker room, so they could be moved in the basement. For evergreen plants the most suitable place is a cool room or a greenhouse, where a heating system could be turned on during cold periods.
Should you keep your flowers in a dark or well lit room during winter?
Many people ask themselves this question when it is time to get the flower pots inside. To answer this question, however, is not that easy. All evergreen plants that keep their leaves throughout the year need to spend the winter on the most well lit place possible, and plants that change leaves every season could go into less lit places.
Important: Complete darkness is not the ideal factor for any plant during winter, since such extreme conditions do not exist in real nature.
That’s why in a room with no windows there should necessary be some light source (such as a lamp for plants).
These simple rules, however, are not universal. The problem is that there are certain plants accustomed to certain climatic conditions and they can keep their greenery during winter under some conditions, and lose it under other conditions. Such plants are the cestrum, banana and the bougainvillea. During winter months, these plants need to be placed in a well-lit spot, preferably next to a window.
The next exception to the rule are the evergreen plants such as Nerium oleander, agapanthus and Laurus nobilis, which can live without a lot of light in winter, but the leaves will fall from their twigs and during the next season, these plants will bloom much later than usual. That is why they need light during winter months.
Image resources:
http://www.publicdomainpictures.net/view-image.php?image=18223&picture=first-winter-snow