A variety of plants coexist on the vegetable garden. But quite rarely you can find an amazing artichoke among the vegetable variety. It is not popular, despite its dietary and medicinal properties.
"Edible Thorn" is the nickname of the plant, whose homeland is North America, assigned to the vegetable crop because of its appearance. But, despite such exotic characteristics, it is quite a healthy fruit.
Description
Before you grow an artichoke in your garden, get acquainted with its main characteristics.
Perennial has a well-developed root system. A powerful plant has large dissected leaves, covered with thorns. Tall, weakly branched stem can reach 2 meters. Externally, the plant looks like a silver-green fountain, strewn with spherical inflorescences of blue color.
Many do not realize that this precious vegetable is not as difficult to grow as it might seem. And you can do this in various climatic zones. Having excellent decorative data, it can be a decoration of any garden vegetable called artichoke.
Cultivation and care
Any vegetable crop has certain features of agricultural technology. Artichoke (Cynara scolymus) can grow in almost any territory, with the exception of those in which it is too hot in the summer. Ideal conditions for growth are cool and humid summers and mild winters. Heat-loving plants include artichoke.
Cultivation and care are due to this property of the plant. It does not tolerate low temperatures. Therefore, long-term cultivation of artichoke is possible only in the southern regions. In winter, shelter of the root system is required . A two-centimeter layer of peat can serve as a covering material. In the autumn period, plant shoots are cut before shelter .
In areas with a cold winter, it is preferable to grow artichoke from seeds as an annual crop.
Basic agricultural requirements
Artichoke is quite demanding on soil fertility. Planting, growing and care are associated with certain growing conditions. Fertile soils are suitable for a strange thorn. The plant is hygrophilous. However, it does not tolerate waterlogging at all. The area where the plants are grown should be light and well warmed up, protected from drafts.
Ways to Grow Artichoke
There are three methods that can be used to obtain an amazing and unique garden of a strange spine: growing artichoke from seeds, seedling and vegetative methods. Each of them will require compliance with certain rules. In southern areas, you can grow an artichoke from seeds. Seed softening of heat-loving crops is used only in areas in which early spring sowing is possible. Seedlings are used to grow artichoke as annual plants in cold climates with 90-100 days of a warm period. For such climatic zones, a vegetative method of propagating a vegetable crop is also available.
Growing Features
Under the plants should make a good dressing. Before sowing seeds, it is necessary to add one cup of full organic fertilizer to the soil, or a compost shovel, or aged chicken droppings. You can also use half a cup of blood meal and bone meal per plant. Also, positive growth dynamics can be stimulated with a 2-3-cm layer of rabbit manure.
If the soil for planting is poor, it is recommended to carry out additional fertilizing in the middle of the season.
Growing artichoke from seeds is due to the fact that, like some other plants, for example rhubarb, some of the plants will not correspond to the variety shown on the label. This occurs in approximately 30% of cases. To replace unwanted plants and maintain their planned number, more seeds should be planted.
It is also necessary to conduct selective selection to obtain varietal seed material. Discard weak plants at the beginning of the season. At the end of the season, specimens with first-class attributes must be selected.
Seedling method
"Edible thorn" is a rather capricious and demanding plant. Growing artichoke from seeds that are sown directly into the ground is not popular. Seedling is considered more reliable.
Plants whose cultivation process was started indoors in winter or early spring will yield crops by the end of summer or early autumn. The necessary temporary reserve is achieved, while the risk of damage from low temperatures is eliminated.
Sowing dates
To harvest an artichoke planted in advance. Growing from seeds in closed ground for seedlings is due to certain time frames. By the time of planting, plants should be 8-10 weeks old. Based on this, it is easy to calculate the timing of sowing seeds. They occur in late February or early March.
Presowing seed treatment
Seeds are packed in gauze bags or envelopes. They are moistened and placed in a glass or plastic dish. Cover with a film and germinate at a temperature of 20-25 degrees. In a week, the seeds will hatch. The seedlings are quenched.
Envelopes with seeds are placed in a refrigerator and kept at a temperature of 0– + 2 degrees for a month. Growing artichoke from seeds that have undergone pre-sowing treatment will improve the quality of the resulting plants.
Growing and caring for seedlings
Seedlings are easy to grow in a greenhouse or under fluorescent lamps at home. Seeds are planted in 15-centimeter containers filled with fertile soil with the addition of peat and humus. Growing artichoke from seeds in closed ground requires compliance with temperature and light conditions. The first two weeks it is maintained at 20 degrees. Next, reduce to 12-14 degrees. It will also be necessary to increase the light period using lamps.
Caring for plants is fairly simple. In addition to observing the light and temperature conditions, regular watering is required.
Vegetative propagation method
Also, for the separation of artichokes, the root separation method can be used. But for this it is necessary to be able to obtain planting material from adult plants.
In early spring, it is necessary to remove branches from the main plant. This can be done with a serrated knife, separating them from the central stems.
Next, the artichoke must be dug up with a shovel so as not to damage the root system. This procedure should be carried out when the plant is not very large, about 30 cm in height.
Each root branch can be planted at a distance of 1-1.5 m from each other.
Split and share artichokes
The division procedure takes place in several stages. The first thing to do is to carefully clean the root shoot with a knife. Next, dig a plant deep enough so that you can separate part of the root system along with the ground. The separated part can be transplanted in any part of the garden or presented to a friend.
You can also purchase sleeping artichoke roots in specialized nurseries. Landing time is determined based on the climatic zone of residence. In warm climates, landing can be done in autumn or winter. In other climatic conditions, the plant should be planted in early spring. Landing is carried out like rooted shoots. Root cuttings should be located vertically, with a growth point located slightly above the surface of the soil.
Although it is considered a moody artichoke, planting, growing and caring for this amazing plant do not differ in special techniques.
Seedlings should reach a height of 8-10 cm, have stocky stems and two sets of perennial leaves. Due to the fact that the plant grows large enough, planting material should be planted at a distance of 1 m from each other. Common agricultural technology - the same as for any vegetable crop. We plant an artichoke on a vegetable bed.
The value of water for the core of artichoke and plant power
Regardless of the variety that is planted, as a rule, the goal is to collect a culture with a delicate texture. The taste of the edible part of the plant is influenced by many factors, the most important of which is the presence of water.
Artichokes require a large number of them - for the production of large succulent buds. Perhaps in hot and dry periods of the year the plant will have to be watered three times a week, especially if buds are formed at this time. Along with a lack of water, nascent buds can destroy a severe frost.
Water also benefits deep artichoke roots that become fleshy and fairly thick. They must remain moist, especially during the driest months. Also, to preserve moisture, the earth can be mulched. Make sure that all water supplied to the base of the plant is well absorbed.
Poor drainage can lead to stagnation of water at the base of the stem, followed by decay of the latter. With a not very cold winter, moist soil can destroy the plant.
Growing tips and the benefits of artichoke
At the end of the summer period, an unusual vegetable blooms. Cutting is done in a few weeks. The buds develop at the tips of one-centimeter stems.
The apical kidney, as a rule, is the largest and ripens the very first. It must be collected with part of the stem directly under the kidney. It should be large, dense and completely closed. Those buds that will not be cut will open with delightful, purplish-blue, 6-centimeter inflorescences similar to the flowers of a thistle. But the transformation of buds into flowers, by the way, can reduce the plant's yield next year in the case of long-term plant cultivation. To prevent this, all kidneys must be cut off. Gardeners, whose plots are in the best climatic conditions for plant growth, can harvest already in the first year. Harvest per plant can be up to 30 artichokes.
The cultivation and benefits of artichoke are worth the unusual plant appearing on the vegetable garden. An amazing vegetable is not only decorative. Many do not realize that an unusual plant is an excellent dietary and rather healthy vegetable. With a rich content of vitamins and minerals, vegetable dishes from it are low-calorie. This is a great component of a diet for weight loss. But the content of inulin transfers it to the category of medicinal plants. Artichoke is widely used in medicine.
Varieties of amazing vegetable
The part of the artichoke that people enjoy is the immature flowering bud of the plant, which belongs to the family of thistles. Various procedures should be carried out if you are going to get an artichoke yourself - planting, growing and caring. Different varieties require similar actions. In addition, each of them has its own distinctive features. There are varieties of this vegetable crop that are suitable for growing in almost any climatic conditions.
For reliable growth in cold climates, you can use the Green Globe variety. The plant begins to bear fruit and ripen early enough, suitable for annual crops.
Violetto, an Italian variety, is distinguished by beautiful purple buds of a slightly elongated shape. It ripens a little later and is suitable for cultivation in warmer weather conditions.
The star of the empire was bred as an annual plant. Its delicious buds are rounded and begin to ripen about a week earlier than the Green Globe.