The most impressive affect of abscisic acid in the inhibition of growth and the maintenance done on the dormancy of buds. Yet this is not enough to keep the dormancy of buds up for the long term. Auxin, cytokinins, and gibberellins do the opposite of abscisic acid, they stimulate growth in the tissues. Acting as a growth inhibitor abscisic acid also suspends growth at the onset of dormancy. Germination will begin when there is an increase of activity of gibberellins or abscisic acid is removed or by its inactivation.
Heavy rain can cause the abscisic acid to be washed out.
Light and other stimulates can trigger the degradation of abscisic acid. The ratio between abscisic acid and gibberellins determine if the dormancy of the terminal buds is controlled by a balance of hormones by the absolute concentration of abscisic acid in dormant seeds when it is an inhibitor of germination. The exact role of the abscisic acid is unknown when the abscission acid appears not to have much effect on the abscission of leaves while there is defiantly an effect on fruit abscission. Also this hormone acts a stress hormone, helping plants cope with adverse conditions that the plant might come across. An example of this is when a flower begins to wilt the abscisic acid collects in the leaves which in turn causes the stomata to close.