Standard Bay Tree: care instructions, please?

I am the very happy recipient of a pair of standard bays (yay me!! ) something on my wish list for some while now.

Well, now I have them and ... I'm a little confused. I *thought* they would look rather lovely (if a little clichéd) outside my front door - they don't fit, so it will be back door. I *thought* they were all year, all round hardy blighters with little to worry about.

However, today, while marking time for an appointment elsewhere I looked at a care label on a standard bay at a different store and noticed it said: "Hardy to -5" Does that mean I need to bring them indoors now? Really thought I could keep them in a pot either side of the door all year round

Another question: even though these are trained as "standards", the person buying them for me bought ones with lots of sprouting shoots coming up through the base of the compost. Are these suckers? Could they be transplanted somehow? If so, how/when/where?

Advice most welcome, thank you

 

Im no expert but could you keep them either side of the door and just cover them with horticultural fleece?

 

Mostly hardy, unless totally arctic winter, might be a bit more tender if growing in pots.

 

As dips suggested, keep some fleece and bubble-wrap handy just in case temps drop drastically. The most vulnerable bits are the stems and the pots.
Bay does sucker and also occasionally drops fertile seed. Rootle about in the compost and if the roots are suckering, try to gently detach suckers from roots by pulling them away. There's less chance of them re-growing from resting buds! You could try potting up the suckers, but evergreens are a pain to root without bottom heat and mist.
Keep an eye open for scale insect and bay sucker (insect). If you don't intend to use the leaves for cooking, a thorough watering with systemic insecticide will deal with both.

 

Thank you fellow GC'ers: top tips and much appreciated

They are in tubs; they are intended to spend their lives in tubs (no soil by any of my outside doors - which is their intended purpose).

Will pop out and get some H.fleece (already have bubble wrap)

@noisette47 - thank you for going the extra mile in advice terms - very much appreciated and I'll have a sucker rummage as soon as it is safe to do so

 

Ours was moved from a pot to the garden about 20 years ago and has survived some pretty severe frosts.

 

As mentioned they are pretty hardy, I saw some large standard bays come through the cold winters of 2011 and 2010 unprotected OK, they did suffer some 'scorching' to the leaves and dropped a few as a result but recovered well once spring got under way

 

Sis's one is in the ground and survived the -20c a few years back

 

Happened to my large bay in a half barrel, but it re-sprouted and came back better than before, although some people lost theirs.