A wonderful climbing plant can bloom for a very long time, many varieties do not fade until the first frost. It is because of this property that most vines can die in late autumn, including clematis. Shelter for the winter, which would provide reliable protection, is the main goal of caring and far-sighted gardeners. What professionals advise about this, read our article.
Suitable time for protection
The weakest point of this flower is the root of the neck, freezing it leads to the rapid death of the whole plant. Therefore, clematis shelter for the winter should be carried out in the fall. The optimal period is the end of October, and in the case of warm weather - the beginning of November. Before the sheltering procedure itself, it is necessary to carry out some work with the flower and soil.
- Clematis must be carefully watered.
- The soil around the plant is treated with copper-containing horticultural agents - they will protect the flower from most fungal diseases. To do this, use iron or copper sulfate, according to the instructions or in a safe 1% concentration. If it’s scary to get involved with toxic drugs, but you don’t have the necessary experience, you should use a simple potassium permanganate solution. It should have a pale pink color.
Creating a flower shelter
After such procedures, it is time to “hide” clematis. Shelter for the winter is based on proper tillage. First, the earth is carefully dug up, the recent hydration of the plant will help. Then the flower is spudded with available soil, while the root neck needs to be treated with crumbled activated carbon, wood ash or fine sand. The height of the protective mound is 10-15 cm - this should be enough to protect clematis. Shelter for the winter also involves pruning young shoots that have formed on the vines of the current season. This procedure must be carried out with such varieties as Crimson Star, Jeepsie Queen, Sizaya bird, Victoria, Nadezhda, Mephistopheles and Luther Burbank.
If the plant was planted in accordance with all the required rules, then its buds will certainly be deep in the ground. It is for this purpose that they make shelter of clematis, so that frost does not damage young shoots and future sprouts. The following rule must be taken into account - in the spring, the lianas will need to be carefully freed from the snow and unearthed. Otherwise, clematis will sprout earlier than necessary and die in the last frosts of the cold season.
Protection of other varieties of vines
There are also varieties that are not pruned before the construction of the shelter - they develop young buds on last year's shoots. These varieties of this plant include: clematis flowery, sprawling and woolly. Naturally, these varieties require more reliable shelter than trimmed species. To protect such clematis, shelters for the winter also begin with hilling, as described previously. Then create a support with a height of about 12-15 cm, on which all shoots are carefully laid.
Next, you need to carefully fix the plant on such a frame using arcs of wire and cover everything with pine spruce or oat straw. Clematis is covered with a thick film or ordinary roofing material on top, it is necessary to ensure that the wind can not tear off the protective "roof" of the structure. Often for this, it is fixed with stones. All defenses must be removed at the end of March, usually in the evening or on a cloudy day.