Beautiful bright succulent from the family Crassulaceae with dense leaves of a cylindrical or elongated shape in the form of a boat. Its Latin name is Sedum, it is able to survive even in adverse arid soils, is unpretentious and will decorate your rockeries and flower beds with chic colors. The diameter of some of them can reach 15 cm. Plant growth up to 80 cm, you can create amazingly beautiful compositions of plants with leaves and flowers of different colors - a beautiful meadow will be the central focus of your garden until the most severe frosts. Small frosts are not terrible to the plant.
Stonecrop leaves are densely planted all over the stem, shades are diverse - from light green to maroon. Already such combinations of leaf color are enough to create magnificent paintings on the territory. By autumn, the leaves become brighter, at this time flowering begins - the gardens have already lost their beauty, and the sedum is just starting to blossom.
Stonecrop prominent, sedum wonderful. The most popular varieties
The best of all ornamental plants in our gardens, sedum will not stand out in a single planting, until autumn it looks pretty boring - the inflorescences are still green and plain. They densely cover the top of the stem, densely feathered thick leaves. The name of the plant, most likely, came from the word sedere (sit) - so tightly placed to each other leaves. There is also a version that the name comes from the word sedo - “subside”. Sedum is a medicinal plant, and has the ability to relieve pain syndromes. A plant stands on the border of the flower bed - it will create a beautiful border and limit the penetration of weeds into the flower bed.
The Diamond variety is the most common, begins to bloom in September and will delight you with pink flowers by the end of October. A plant up to 80 cm tall, Star dust variety goes well with it, growth is only 35 cm, the flowers are light, white and cream, it begins to bloom in August. This variety should be planted in front of a high Diamond; the flowerbed will acquire a gradual transition of both color and beauty. A great addition to the composition can be the Karl variety - it has amazing frost resistance and stands green before the thaw begins.
Bright in its amazing originality include the Iceberg variety with bright white flowers, the Carmen variety, which is crowned with bright red inflorescences. Very interesting coloration of the leaves of Sedum cultivar Frosty Morne - the leaves are painted almost white. The Diamond Edge variety has dark green leaves with a white border, it looks great in the foreground of the composition due to its growth - only 25 cm, flowers are light pink, collected in inflorescences.
Plant care
One of the most picky plants on your site. The only thing the sedum claims is lighting. Your succulent will not want to bloom at all, if the sun is not enough for it, flower stalks may not appear, but sufficient lighting guarantees abundant and bright flowering for a long time.
The soil for the plant should be light, a mixture of sand and compost is the right choice of soil, you can add very little humus and limit mineral fertilizers - stonecrop may not be accepted. And the most pleasant side in the care of the plant - unpretentiousness to watering. The plant is more likely to tolerate arid soil than excess moisture. There is no need to transplant the stonecrop, it will feel great in one place for a very long time. Only young plants ask for a little moisture, but they should still not be "transfused". With some freezing of the carpet, you can redraw individual places, and yet it is worth leaving the planting for self-seeding.
Propagation of the plant is done by planting shoots of shoots in the soil - you need to cut the stems and leave them in a warm place without moisture, after 40-45 days roots will appear from the axils of the leaves. Ready for planting young plants need to be cleaned of dry leaves and dug in drawers for seedlings. Plants need lighting and poor watering, by spring they will be ready for planting in open ground.
Garden decoration - unpretentious stonecrop
It is very difficult to create a beautiful garden from annual plants - they are rather capricious and require regular maintenance. If you want to give plantings a minimum of attention and get an excellent result, use unpretentious succulent in flower beds and rockeries. It perfectly takes root in the most ordinary soil, feels great during a drought, does not require top dressing, and easily reproduces itself. We can say with confidence that this plant is for “lazy gardeners”: plant several varieties of sedum, and let them exist independently.
It doesn’t matter what style of garden design you have chosen - flowerbeds, rockeries, hills, borders - in any landscape design, stonecrop looks great. It is worth collecting several varieties of plants of different heights and planting them on the site - nature will do the rest for you. In addition to its unique unpretentiousness to soil and watering, it is worth noting the medicinal properties of stonecrop. The only thing that lovers of homeopathy should pay attention to is that it is not recommended to use the caustic variety; all others are excellent for ischemia, diseases of the gastrointestinal tract, and epilepsy. Excellent results in the treatment of burns, tropical ulcers, with bone fractures.
Recipes for the preparation of infusions and ointments can be found in folk medicine. Sedum perfectly relieves pain, lowers blood pressure, removes toxins from the body. It is not used for malignant tumors and gastritis.
According to legend, using a crushed sheet healed the wound of Telephos, son of Hercules. As the pharmacists determined, in the juice of the stonecrop there is a lot of oxalic, citric and malic acid, which disinfects wounds and destroys microbes. By its qualities, stonecrop juice can be equated to aloe extract.
Stonecrop at room conditions
It is unfortunate, but this ornamental plant almost does not bloom at home, it is hindered by the lack of light and too high a temperature in the winter season. However, you can decorate the room with plants in hanging vases - you can create beautiful compositions with tall plants, like a sansevier. Very beautiful color combinations of the leaves are obtained - the dark green tall leaves of the sanseviera and the hanging branches of the sedum perfectly complement each other. We can say for sure that these plants get along in a large flower pot, successfully complementing each other both in color and in mood.
Both types of plants do not tolerate too frequent transplants, do not like mineral fertilizers, prefer light soil with sand, feel great in loam, and will accept ordinary garden soil. An excess of nitric acid fertilizers can cause discoloration of the leaves. To feed garden plants, you can still use a little diluted slurry, but it can also cause plants to fall out during severe frosts.
Transplantation and reproduction
The plant feels very good for five years after planting. Stonecrops that are the most popular in the climatic conditions of Russia: caustic, white, bent, visible and false - Brilliant, Carmen, Bright and Xenox varieties do not require as much attention as Lidian, Spanish, Siebold, Evers, these varieties need to be covered a little in snowless winters, otherwise by spring you will have to deal with weeding and selection of dead processes. The plant grows very quickly, bald spots tighten by themselves. You can cut off faded inflorescences to restore the decorative appearance of flower beds and beds
Creeping stonecrop shoots do poorly with weeds themselves - you will have to take care of planting care. And only a caustic sedum destroys everything around - there will be no weeds in the flower beds and rockeries near it. Be careful about varietal plants - like everything that was created not by nature, but by human hands - such species and varieties require an attentive attitude, it is worth plucking out “wild” green shoots, because the variety can completely degenerate.
If small stonecrops are best cut, then large varieties are well propagated by dividing rhizomes. Separated roots are slightly dried in a cool place before planting or dusted with fungicide.
Plant diseases and pests
The plant is very resistant to disease, the owner of the garden plot will not have any problems with sedum. Sometimes, in the very middle of summer, in large-leaved stonecrops, false caterpillars of real sawflies from the Tenthredinidae family may appear. Plants need to be treated with an “actelik” or robbed and destroyed. The plant does not like an excess of moisture, in such wet weather fungal diseases in the form of dark spots on the whole plant can develop. Sick areas of stonecrop need to be cut and burned.
Only large stonecrops suffer from aphids, which are destroyed by insecticides suitable for currant fruit bushes. More recently, thrips has appeared, from the impact of which the tops of plants are bent. Young plants are frightened by the weevil, the grooved scythe, which is simply shaken off the plants on white paper and destroyed. The larvae of this pest damage the roots of the plant.
The most unpretentious and very decorative plant for gardens is stonecrop, which can definitely be called the favorite of many undemanding owners who devote a little time to caring for the garden. It winters well, blooms richly in autumn, and practically does not get sick. This beautiful plant can also be grown indoors, if the room has enough lighting - sedum is light-loving and does not require much moisture.