Garden perennial geranium on your site: description, reproduction and care

Geranium is a hardy plant with beautiful flowers and leaves. This plant has taken root well as a room flowerpot; various beliefs and signs make up it according to it.

If you do not have time to grow seedlings of annual flowers every year, planting garden perennial geraniums in the country house will significantly reduce the laboriousness of decorating the flowerbed. It is also called the crane. It is unpretentious and is found in all regions with a temperate climate, where it lives along rivers, in meadows, in deciduous and coniferous forests. And among a wide variety of varieties, you can easily find the one that suits you.

Description of a street flower

Street called cultivated garden geranium. Having preserved the best qualities of nature: love for the sun and shade tolerance, adaptability to drought and at the same time frost resistance, it became brighter with large flowers and decorative terry-leafed leaves.

For growing in the garden, winter-hardy perennial geraniums are used, and annuals are usually grown at home.

Heat-loving species of plants that bloom all summer on window sills, on the balcony or as annuals in the garden, it is more correct to call pelargonium. But since pelargoniums also come from the geranium family, they are often called geraniums.

On a note. The only one-year-old street flower recommended by gardeners for the garden is Robert G.'s geranium (G.robertianum). The plant is characterized by self-sowing, lush flowering, it loves shade.

The most popular garden geranium has the following features:

• perennial;
• frost resistant;
• can grow in the shade;
• resistant to drought;
• capable of self-propagation;
• minimal care.

Kinds

Breeders have bred more than one hundred varieties of geraniums that differ not only in shades. The most popular among gardeners are 10-12 perennial and frost-resistant species.

By what criteria do they differ:

1. Short and tall:
   • up to 50 cm - for example, large-rhizome (G.macrorrhizum);
   • above 50 cm - meadow geranium (G.pratense), red-brown (G.phaeum).
2. By coloring flowers and leaves:
   • evergreen geranium - blood-red (G.sanguineum L.), red-brown (G.phaeum);
   • with the original color of the leaves - large-rhizome (G.macrorrhizum), small stamen (G.psilostémon), Georgian (G.ibericum).
3. Shade tolerance:
   • photophilous geranium - Himalayan or otherwise large-flowered (G.himalayense = G.grandiflorum), magnificent geranium (Gx magnificum), Georgian (G.ibericum), Renard (G.renardii), flat-billed (G.platypetalum), large-rhizome (G.macrorrhizum ), small stamen (G.psilostémon);
   • shade-tolerant - marsh (G.paluster), blood-red geranium (G.sanguineum L.), meadow (G.pratense);
   • shade-loving - forest geranium (G.sylvaticum), red-brown (G.phaeum).
4. Drought tolerance:
   • ashen (G.cinereum);
   • Renard (G.renardii);
   • Dalmatian (G.dalmaticum);
   • large-rhizome (G.macrorrhizum).

There is a very important nuance for the beauty of the garden that species of geranium differ in flowering time.

1. In late May - early June:
   • the magnificent geranium blooms in large lilac flowers (G.x magnificum);
   • forest (G.sylvaticum);
   • Himalayan or otherwise large-flowered (G.himalayense = G.grandiflorum).
2. By mid-June:
   • a large-rhizome or otherwise Bulgarian, Balkan (G.macrorrhizum) blooms with the ability to actively spread throughout the site;
   • Georgian (G.ibericum);
   • small stamen (G.psilostémon).
3. In June - July:
   • blooms with blue or lilac flowers with dissected leaves, meadow geranium (G.pratense);
   • marsh (G. palustre);
   • ashen (G.cinereum).
4. From the beginning to the end of summer blooming red-blooming geranium (G.sanguineum L.) with asterisks.

Photo

See how the different varieties of geranium look:

Meadow geranium (G.pratense). Read about the healing properties and contraindications of meadow geranium, read here.

Georgian geranium (G.ibericum).

Gorgeous geranium (G.x magnificum)

Ash Geranium (G.cinereum).

Blood red geranium (G.sanguineum L.).

Landing

Note! Garden perennial geraniums are planted with islands - when there are several bushes nearby.

Landing Stages:

1. The choice of planting material. Can be used:
   • rhizome with additional roots and kidney renewal;
   • processes with leaflets;
   • seedlings;
   • seeds.

   When choosing planting material, the future landing site should be considered:

   • species more than 50 cm high are suitable for flower beds and flower beds, for example, meadow (G.pratense), red-brown (G.phaeum);
   • for frame paths - plants up to 50 cm high, for example, large-rhizome geranium (G.macrorrhizum).
2. Choosing the place where the geranium will grow. What is important:
   • good lighting;
   • sometimes light partial shade;
   • the presence of a small hill so that there is no near groundwater.
3. Soil preparation. It is enough to observe the conditions:
   • good water permeability of the soil and the absence of stagnation of water;
   • When digging (two bayonet spades deep), add compost and peat.
   Important! Adding not rotted compost to the soil can negatively affect geraniums.
4. We make landing pits. Requirements:
   • the pit should be 20 cm deeper than the root length;
   • at the bottom, to prevent stagnation of water, there should be drainage (gravel, broken brick, small stones);
   • pour a mixture of sand and peat on the drainage.
5. Actually planting geraniums. Be sure to water abundantly after planting.
6. Mulching. To mulch is to sprinkle the soil around the plant with organic mulch (bark, wood chips, dry peat or garden compost).

Thinning shrubs

Every two years and preferably in spring, garden geraniums are recommended to be replanted, because during this time it grows very much.

Long-term garden geranium transplantation does not tolerate well due to branched long roots. This point must be taken into account by making the landing pit deep in order to straighten the roots in it. Sprinkle gently with earth, pour over and generously mulch.

The distance between the islands (when several bushes are nearby) should be about 20-30 cm.

Care

Geranium is an unpretentious plant, but minimal care is still required.

It:

1. watering - moderate, but regular, especially in the first months after planting and during droughts (wilted leaves quickly recover after irrigation);
2. top dressing - geraniums do not particularly need them, making compost or peat during planting is enough;
3. pruning - cutting dried flowers in summer and wilted greens in autumn or spring.

Propagation by cuttings

Geranium propagation is possible:

• by seeds;
• seedlings;
• rhizome division;
• cuttings.

To get the cuttings, it is enough to cut off the processes with leaves from an adult plant.

Then:

1. put them in a glass of water;
2. keep in a warm room for 2-3 weeks;
3. when the cuttings take root, they can be planted in the ground.

Reference. When using a special solution for the formation of roots, cuttings can not be placed in water for germination, but immediately planted in the ground.

Use in landscape design

Garden geranium is able to decorate any site:

1. possessing a tenacious rhizome, it is ideal for areas with a noticeable slope;
2. Georgian geranium (G.ibericum) looks good on an alpine hill;
3. Oxford creeping (G.endressii) quickly closes among flowers of emptiness;
4. the spherical shape of plants beautifully frames the paths;
5. Using geranium with flowers of different shades, you can make bright flower beds.

Possible problems and illnesses

Geranium, like any plant, is susceptible to disease and damage by pests.

Signs of the disease:

• yellowing of leaves due to insufficient watering;
• bare stems from below with a lack of light;
• brown spots (infection with a fungus), with a strong defeat, the plant is recommended to burn.

Pests:

1. aphid - recommended spraying with special insecticides;
2. whiteflies - for destruction use the drug "Spark";
3. caterpillars - they are collected manually.

After 5-7 days, spraying is repeated.

Garden perennial geranium, rightly loved by gardeners, is a wonderful decoration of any site. The plant does not require special care, but allows you to create bright multi-colored compositions throughout the season. Due to the variety of species, you can choose geranium for every taste.

Watch the video: GERANIUM CARE BASICS & 4 GERANIUM TYPES (October 2024).