Many gardeners are not very flattering about sea buckthorn, considering it a very prickly plant with sour berries. And after the uprooting of the older plants, a large amount of overgrowth remains. Wild buckthorn tree has all these shortcomings. But modern varieties of culture will certainly please any gardener.
A little bit about culture ...
Sea buckthorn tree is a fairly common plant for our country. Large thickets of culture are found in Central Asia and the Caucasus, Altai and the Baltic states, as well as in Eastern and Western Siberia. Since ancient times, the fruits of sea buckthorn have been used in processed and fresh form.
As a decorative culture, sea buckthorn began to be propagated 150 years ago. The cultivation of industrial varieties involved in the Research Institute of Horticulture . Lisavenko M.A., in which several fairly promising species were obtained. They began to show special interest in sea buckthorn in recent decades, when the beneficial properties of fruits were revealed.
In the Moscow region, sea buckthorn began to spread in the forties. She appeared in the region thanks to T.T. Trofimov, an employee of the Botanical Garden of Moscow State University Currently, the culture has gained incredible distribution in the suburbs. In order to successfully grow a plant and get a crop, you need to know some of the features of planting sea buckthorn and care for it.
The value of sea buckthorn
The popularity of culture is associated with its incredible beneficial properties. Few people know how sea buckthorn blooms, but everyone knows what its fruits look like. Small bright berries contain vitamins B, P, B2, E, B, C and carotene (provitamin A). In addition, the fruits are rich in manganese, iron, boron, magnesium, sulfur, aluminum, titanium and silicon. Outwardly, they are juicy drupe sweet-sour or sour in taste, enriched with acids. The acid content of different varieties, of course, is different, this indicator ranges from one to four percent. But the sugar content is in the range of 1.6 - 6.4%. However, it is worth noting that not only the fruits of culture are gifted by nature with a large number of useful substances. Sea buckthorn leaves, for example, contain many vitamins C and A. As the bright fruits ripen, the number of vitamins in the foliage decreases sharply.
Speaking about the beneficial properties of culture, it is worth recalling sea buckthorn oil, which is richer than all known vegetable oils in terms of the amount of biologically active substances. It is actively used in the treatment of a variety of ailments, it is especially effective for problems with the skin - frostbite, burns, radiation injuries.
In traditional medicine, sea buckthorn has long been used to treat rheumatism and gastrointestinal problems.
Is sea buckthorn harmful?
Despite all its useful properties, sea buckthorn can harm those people who suffer from allergic reactions. In addition, it is worth remembering that the fruits contain many acids, which are harmful for pancreatitis, cholecystitis and inflammation of the duodenum.
Biological features of the culture
Sea buckthorn is a rather thorny and branched shrub, the height of which reaches 3.5 meters. The culture can take the form of a tree up to six meters tall. The trunk of the plant is covered with black-brown or dark gray bark. And the leaves of sea buckthorn have a characteristic two-tone color: silver and green on top below. Under favorable conditions, the culture quickly grows.
When and how does sea buckthorn bloom?
However, it has one feature. In nature, there are male and female plants. But how to distinguish between male and female sea buckthorn is a question that invariably interests all gardeners who have the intention to get a crop. If you plant same-sex trees on the site, you will not be able to get fruits from them. The thing is that the culture is wind-pollinated, although species with bisexual flowers are sometimes found.
In order to plant seedlings of both sexes, you must understand how to distinguish between male and female sea buckthorn. Unfortunately for gardeners, it’s almost impossible to find differences in the early stages. They become a little noticeable from the moment of laying flower buds. On the sea buckthorn they are much larger than on the female. An interesting fact is that they are laid on two-year-old shoots. About how sea buckthorn blooms, few people know. This is due to the fact that the flowers of the culture are completely unprepossessing, so no one notices them against the background of fragrant apple trees, peaches and cherries.
Trees bloom in May or April. Flowers appear with foliage. However, on heterosexual bushes, they have a different color. On the female sea buckthorn, they are yellowish, but on the male buckthorn, they are silver-brown. You cannot call beautiful inflorescences. Sea buckthorn flowers merge slightly with foliage, and therefore are not noticeable.
Plant fruits
After flowering, fruits are ripened that ripen in August or September. Juicy drupes can have an orange or red color. The fruits of wild sea buckthorn are medium-sized, about the size of a pea. They are very densely located on the branches, whence the plant got the name "sea buckthorn". The fruits have a peculiar aroma and a bitter-sour taste. If they are not removed from the tree, then the berries can hold out on branches throughout the winter.
Sea buckthorn planting
Sea buckthorn is planted in spring and autumn. As a rule, plants planted in the spring take root much better, because they are not threatened by winter temperature changes. For a young seedling, both excessive heat and cold can do much harm.
Proper planting of sea buckthorn in the spring is the key to the fact that the plant will certainly take root. However, it is worth deciding on the variety in advance, it must be adapted to the conditions of your region. Seedlings are best purchased in proven nurseries, rather than in markets. So you can be sure that you have purchased the plant of the particular variety that you have chosen.
For buckthorn buckthorn, you need to choose the right place in your area. Preference should be given to calm areas away from active gardening. This is due to the fact that the plant has cord-like roots located in the upper layers of the soil. In order to avoid injuries during digging, it is worth planting the culture in quiet places. However, it is worth remembering that buckthorn buckthorn loves unshaded bright places.
Since the fall, you can prepare a place for landing. For this, sand and humus should be added to the soil in equal proportions, and phosphorus-potassium additives will not interfere. The distance between the trees should be at least several meters. If you plan to get a crop, then you need to plant at least 3-4 plants. For five female cultures, one male is enough.
The process of planting a tree or bush is not difficult. A pit of 70 * 70 * 70 centimeters is prepared, at the bottom of which you need to make a mound, along the slopes of which to straighten the roots. Then the pit is filled with soil a little higher than the root neck. Around the seedling, you definitely need to form a hole to water it. Two buckets of water will be enough for watering.
Crop care
A description of sea buckthorn would be incomplete, if not a few words about how it should be taken care of. Young seedlings need regular watering, as the culture is hygrophilous. Once the plant is strong, the frequency of watering can be reduced. Experienced gardeners do not recommend applying top dressing to the near-stem circle due to the cord-like root system. But after the sea buckthorn blooms and the fruits appear, the plant can be fed with mineral and organic fertilizers. This is done no more than once every three years.
Plant care also includes weed removal. However, this must be done carefully so as not to damage the root system. The formation of the crown and pruning of trees should be done in spring until the buds open. Blooming sea-buckthorn should never be injured. After reaching 8 years, the plant should be pruned regularly to rejuvenate. To do this, remove the old shoots, and leave three years. In addition, it is certainly worth removing frozen and diseased sections of branches.
Do not forget about watering adult trees. Sometimes in dry periods, even strong plants can dry out or lose crops.
How to choose a variety for the suburbs?
Thanks to the hard work of breeders, it is now possible to select a variety for cultivation in almost any region of the country. The plant bears fruit well in the climatic conditions of Central Russia, which means that you can choose the right kind of sea buckthorn for the Moscow region. In order to understand which grade to give priority, you need to know what parameters are important for you: productivity, ripening, taste, winter tolerance, fruit size, oil concentration, nutrient content, absence of thorns and thorns.
Experienced gardeners recommend paying attention to the following promising varieties for the Moscow region:
- Lomonosovskaya. This is a medium-sized tree with few spines. Red-orange fruits are elongated and have a sweet and sour taste.
- Fragrant. Medium-sized plant with high productivity. The pulp of the fruit has a characteristic pineapple flavor.
- Botanical amateur. Medium-sized tree with high productivity and large orange berries.
- Botanical fragrant. A medium-sized tree with orange-red fruits can produce up to 14 kilograms of crop.
- Excellent. Early ripe grade of high productivity.
Propagation of sea buckthorn
Sea buckthorn is propagated in the following ways: seeds, layering and shoots. The seed method is completely ineffective, it is very laborious, and the resulting plants do not inherit the necessary qualities of the mother tree.
But when propagating by shoots, young seedlings have the same characteristics as the main plant. For gardeners with sea buckthorn in the garden, the most convenient way to get seedlings is the method of layering. In spring, branches located near the ground are sprinkled with earth. Gradually buried shoots will give roots. Next spring they can be dug up, cut off from the main plant and planted in a new place.
But still, the highest quality specimens for planting are obtained by cuttings. To do this, cut the branches in the middle of summer, treat them with “Kornevin,” and then drop them into a moist substrate. Cover the seedling on top with a disposable cup to make a mini-greenhouse. Cuttings should be regularly watered and ventilated. After eight weeks, shelter over them can be removed and further looked after until spring. With the onset of heat, young seedlings are planted in a permanent place.
It must be remembered that sea buckthorn is a bisexual plant, and therefore, male and female plants must certainly grow in one area, otherwise you will never wait for the harvest.
Among other things, buckthorn is vaccinated. On one tree, you can plant branches of a female and male species. Getting such a plant is a tempting undertaking, but not always feasible in real life. The grafted pagons do not always take root well, gradually dry out, not giving growth. But it’s worth experimenting.
Harvesting
Harvesting a big crop of sea buckthorn is not an easy task. Time-consuming work will require you to spend enough time. Berries of most varieties have very short stalks, and therefore picking the fruits is not easy. In addition, you need to work carefully, as the overripe berries crumple quickly. Do not forget about sharp spikes that injure your hands.
Some gardeners recommend making the task easier by cutting off a third of the branches with secateurs along with the crop. Firstly, thus picking berries in the future is much easier and faster, and secondly, the branches can be stored for a long time in the room with the fruits. Do not worry about cut pagons. In their place in the spring a new shoot will grow, which will bear fruit in two years. The tree does not suffer from this, because every year in the spring you still prune old branches anyway.
Diseases to which culture is exposed
It was previously believed that sea buckthorn is completely not susceptible to all kinds of diseases. However, the more it became common in our gardens, the more often gardeners began to notice that the culture is subject to all the ailments that other garden trees: viral, fungal and bacterial.
Most often, sea buckthorn is affected by such diseases:
- Endomycosis is a fungal disease that appears in early August on the fruits, as a result of which they become flabby and filled with gray mucus. The integrity of the berries is violated, a liquid flows out of them, which further spreads the endomycosis. The treatment of the disease consists in treating a (two-stage) tree with Bordeaux liquid (1%). The first time the plant is treated immediately after flowering, and the second - already in mid-July.
- Black cancer. The disease manifests itself in the form of black spots on large branches. In such places, the bark blackens and gradually falls off, and the wood rots. As therapeutic measures for such an ailment, damaged bark and affected wood are removed, after which fresh sections are treated with copper sulfate and a mixture of mullein and clay.
- The black leg is caused by soil fungi. It affects only young seedlings. As a prophylaxis, young plants should be watered with a potassium permanganate solution.
- The scab is caused by fungi and affects the fruits, leaves and young shoots, which leads not only to the drying out of the branches, but also of the whole tree. If you noticed black shiny spots on the berries in mid-summer, then this is scab. Gradually, the disease will pass to young branches. As a preventive measure, the tree should be sanitized annually in the autumn, burning garbage. In addition, 20 days before harvesting, sea buckthorn must be treated with Bordeaux liquid (1%).
- Brown and gray rot usually occurs in July during the rainy season. Gray rot causes wrinkling of the berries, and brown provokes the appearance of dark spots on the fruits. Affected plants are recommended to be cut down and burned.
Pest of sea buckthorn
The most dangerous pests for wood are:
- Sea buckthorn moth. Caterpillars penetrate into swollen kidneys and destroy them from the inside. The most effective way to combat moths is to treat the culture of malathion.
- Sea buckthorn fly can destroy the entire crop. Insects appear in mid-June. Larvae of flies infect the fruits from within. As a preventative measure, it is recommended to treat the tree in July with chlorophos.
- Sea buckthorn aphids feed on the juice of foliage and young branches. Insects settle on the back of the leaf plate, making it curl and turn yellow. Many gardeners in the fight against aphids use the old folk methods, treating wood with infusions of tobacco or onion husks. If such techniques are ineffective, then you can use karbofos.
- Sea buckthorn tick is a very small insect that sucks the juice from the leaves, which makes it fall. As methods for combating ticks, you can use the same solutions as for combating aphids.
Instead of an afterword
Growing sea buckthorn is not difficult, following the simplest rules of care, you can get a good harvest of incredibly healthy berries. However, it is wise to approach the selection of a variety suitable for your region. Experienced gardeners recommend preferring zoned hybrids. The acquisition of good seedlings is the key to successful cultivation.