The perennial lobelia plant is not too demanding in care. It is suitable for growing, both at home and in the garden, on a summer cottage, on an open balcony. These are small bushes, therefore, plants planted close to each other create a very beautiful carpet. In this article we will talk about the features of growing lobelia from seeds and the rules for caring for the plant.
Lobelia growers grow in pots, in containers, in hanging flower pots and in the open ground. In addition to blue and blue lobelia, which are the most common, today numerous varieties with raspberry, pink, white and red flowers are bred.
Lobelia: types and varieties
Florists fell in love with Lobelia for its magnificent flowering, which begins in May and ends shortly before the onset of the first frost. The best varieties include:
- “White Lady”, “White Palace” - with white flowers.
- "Crystal Palace" - with purple inflorescences.
- "Sapphire", "Cambridge Blue" - plants with blue and blue shades of flowers.
- Cardinal lobelia, fiery lobelia - red, raspberry and burgundy flowers.
Ampel lobelia
Of great interest to gardeners are varieties of ampel lobelia. Growing from the seeds of these plants is not difficult at all. These flowers look like huge balls in flowerpots. In addition, they are planted in a cache-pot, and used as a groundcover. As a rule, varieties of ampel lobelia are hybrids. On packages, they are indicated by the symbol F1. The most popular of them include:
- "Sapphire". The plant forms a magnificent bush, with long (up to 35 cm), hanging shoots. Small blue flowers have white blotches on the petals.
- The Blue Fountain. A compact bush is formed from 6-8 shoots. The length of the stems does not exceed 30 cm. Flowers are blue in color with a white speck in the center.
- The Red Cascade. Well-developed bush with strong shoots. Their length sometimes exceeds 35 cm. The plant blooms profusely. Despite the fact that the name of the variety has the word "red", its flowers are rather dark pink or close to raspberry tones.
- "Regatta". Pretty popular variety. The plant forms a lush beautiful bush. Flowers have a different color, often pink and purple tones.
Lobelia: growing from seeds, photo. When to plant?
The plant blooms in 60-75 days (depending on the region of cultivation) after sowing. The soil for planting seeds of this plant is warming up by mid-May. Such a late planting forces gardeners to lose most of the warm season and flowering in this case begins only towards the end of summer. For your first experience of growing lobelia from seeds to be successful, you need to know when to plant them in the soil.
Seeds are planted in the third decade of February or in early March in containers on the windows of an apartment or in heated greenhouses.
Soil and tanks for lobelia
If you plan to grow lobelia from seeds, you need to take care of the planting tanks and soil in advance. The soil should be loose, airy, neutral in pH. As a rule, novice growers acquire special soil for seedlings in specialized stores, although it can be prepared independently. For this you will need: humus, peat, turf in two parts and one part of large river sand.
In addition, a little dolomite flour is added to the soil to reduce acidity. Lobelia also develops well on a soil mixture prepared in the following way: it is necessary to mix vermiculite, river sand, humus or earth from the garden.
The use of peat tablets when growing lobelia from seeds is very popular today. They save gardeners from the need to search for containers for seeds, picking seedlings. In addition, young plants can be planted in the ground without being removed from the substrate.
But most often, plastic or wooden boxes are used to grow lobelia from seeds. You can also use jars of food. Any containers must be thoroughly washed with water and soda or soap. It is convenient to sow seeds in plastic cassettes - in this case, there is also no need to pick small sprouts. Yogurt glasses, for example, are also suitable.
Any soil - brought from the cottage or purchased in the store, must be decontaminated before use. You can warm it up a couple, calcine in the oven, spill with a weak solution of fungicide or boiling water.
Sowing seeds and growing lobelia seedlings
As lobelia grows and develops rather slowly, gardeners begin to grow seedlings at a time when there is still snow on the street to get flowering bushes in early summer. Lobelia begins to bloom no earlier than 8 weeks after sowing seeds. The sowing period varies from mid-February to April (depending on the region). Some gardeners sow lobelia in January to get beautiful flowering bushes at the very beginning of summer. In this case, you can arrange borders along the paths in the garden quite early.
The difficulty in growing lobelia from seed to seedlings is that due to the early sowing of the crop, it lacks a short daylight hours. Therefore, it is necessary to highlight the seedlings with the help of phytolamps and lamps. Some gardeners believe that the lobelia seeds that are sown in March sprout faster and very soon catch up with those seedlings that were sown in February. If you wish, you can check whether this is true.
Growing lobelia from seeds at home at the indicated times allows you to use the first sunny spring days so that the sprouts do not stretch too high due to lack of light, but grow strong and strong. This greatly facilitates picking, as well as transplanting plants into the ground. It is important not to thicken the planting too much, as the plants will not develop well, their stems will be unviable.
Often sowing seeds depends on the packaging in which the producer produces them. Most often, lobelia seeds are produced in paper bags. In this case, sowing is carried out in the classic and easiest way - just into the ground. For convenience, the seeds are mixed with sand and, pouring them on a sheet of paper, gently sprinkle them on the surface of the soil.
Sometimes seeds are produced in paper bags, the inner side of which is covered with polyethylene. In this case, some difficulties may arise: the seeds stick to the walls of the bag, electrify. As a result, it can be very difficult to pour them out, given that they are very small. They should be removed from the bag with a paper strip, and laid out on a paper sheet.
You can start growing lobelia from seeds from the end of February. It is convenient to sow them in small heaps - in this case, seedlings will be easier to plant. Seeds should not be sprinkled with earth. Lobelia actively rises in the sun at a temperature of + 20-22 ° C. Sown seeds are watered with a pale pink solution of potassium permanganate. On top of the box is covered with glass. Ventilate the seedlings every day, remove accumulated condensate from the glass.
The first sprouts of lobelia appear after about seven days, after which the glass can be removed, and cover the container with seedlings with plastic wrap. It should be removed daily and turned over. After the first sprouts appear, the temperature can be lowered to +15 ° C. During the day, it is advisable to place the flowers on the balcony, but at night they should definitely be brought into the heat.
Shelter should not be drastically removed from seedlings - seedlings can die. The coating is removed when the sprouts reach a centimeter in height. With proper cultivation of lobelia flowers from seeds, the soil should be constantly kept slightly moist.
At first, you need to very carefully water the seedlings - young sprouts are too tender and they can simply fall off the weight of the water, so they should be watered under the roots of a syringe or pipette. It will take about three weeks for the plants to grow stronger, and then they can be watered with less caution.
Experienced flower growers recommend pinching seedlings that have grown to three centimeters. This contributes to the development and strengthening of the root system and increase the bushiness of the plant.
Lobelia pick
A month after the emergence of seedlings, lobelia seedlings need a pick. The signal for this procedure is the appearance of the first two or three true leaves. There are two ways to do this:
- Plants are transferred to separate pots or special containers for seedlings, of which later, together with a lump of land, transplanted into open ground.
- Lobelia is dived in groups into a container by the square-nesting method at a distance of four centimeters.
Lobelia: landing in the open ground
Hardening seedlings continues to grow lobelia from seeds. On the first day it can not be put in the wind and the sun. For this, a quiet, warm day is suitable. Put the seedlings in the shade. The next day - at partial shade, and only after that the plants can be exposed to the sunny area for an hour or two.
Where to plant seedlings?
Lobelia grows equally well in the sun, and in places where the sun's rays drop in for 2-3 hours a day. Therefore, there are no serious restrictions in choosing a place for landing.
Landing pattern
Planting plants at a distance of 15 cm, you will get a solid carpet on your site, and with a distance between bushes of 25 cm, you can grow free-standing beautiful balls.
The soil
Lobelia perfectly develops on breathable loose soils without stagnation of moisture. It should not be grown on fertile soils. Otherwise, the plant will accumulate green mass, and flowering will be weak. For the same reason, nitrogen fertilizers should not be used.
Watering
Lobelia, like most ornamental plants, prefers moderate watering, without waterlogging. When growing lobelia from seeds, the plant blooms profusely in open ground from June to the end of October. Lobelia tolerates a short drought quite easily, but when the moisture is not enough, the plant ceases to bloom.