Growing Abutilone And Poinsettia Indoors

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

Indoor Maple and Christmas Star

On New Year's and Christmas holidays, "Christmas Star" and indoor maple delight with their flowering. According to the horoscope, the zodiac sign Aquarius (January 21 - February 19) corresponds to plants: abutilon (indoor maple) and the most beautiful poinsettia ("Christmas star")

Abutilon - indoor maple

The South American abutilon has beautiful wedge-shaped, five-lobed leaves of light green color, which resemble the leaves of a tree in our latitudes - the common maple. For this similarity, the plant received the nickname "indoor maple"; sometimes people also call him a cable car.

Florists grow mainly hybrid abutilon - a well-branching shrub (up to 1.5 m high) with slightly hairy leaves of various colors (green or variegated) and large drooping single flowers (sometimes yellow, white, pink and red) on long pedicels.

Indoor maple is often used as a landscaping plant for spacious rooms with wide and high walls, when you need to get a large vegetative mass, as it grows quickly. Abutilon is also endowed with a remarkable ability: to bloom under good conditions in the winter - for the sake of this quality, many growers keep it in their apartments.

Although the cable car is considered unpretentious to growing conditions, it is very photophilous. In order for the indoor maple to develop well and bloom, it must be placed on a light windowsill with sufficient (several hours a day) amount of direct sunlight or in a sunny place. If installed with artificial light bulbs, it blooms profusely and continuously from early spring to late autumn. Under optimal conditions for its life, it does not stop blooming even in winter. But in low light, abutilone may not bloom at all.

For all summer months, the cable car can be exposed to the open air, but drafts must be excluded: foliage and flowers fall. In the summer it must be watered abundantly, but excessive moisture is undesirable (as well as overdrying the root system): the plant sheds its leaves. Spraying the leaf mass with water every day leads to its active growth.

In winter, watering is significantly reduced - watering only when the soil dries up. To maintain high air humidity, in addition to spraying the leaves, place bowls with evaporating water next to it and maintain a temperature of 13 … 16 ° C.

With good care, the plant quickly develops a vegetative and root system. Therefore, the transshipment is done twice a year - as the soil substrate is completely entwined with the root system, removing old and weak stems. To do this, a pot is selected, following the usual rule: the old container must enter a new container without large gaps. This pattern is especially necessary for the rope-way: it blooms profusely only if its roots are well entwined with an earthen lump in a pot, i.e. the plant does not "fatten".

For abundant flowering of the plant, it is also recommended to carry out spring pruning of its long shoots: they are shortened by 30-50%. Such a tough pruning is necessary for the plant due to the uneven growth of its branches. The soil substrate is prepared from sod and humus soil with the addition of peat and sand (ratio 3: 1: 1: 0.5). During active growth, the plant is fed with a weak solution of organic or complete mineral fertilizer (1-2 times a month).

Indoor maple is propagated by stem cuttings taken during the spring pruning of the bush. Their rooting under favorable conditions (temperature 20 … 22 ° C) occurs in about two weeks.

"Christmas Star"

The most beautiful poinsettia, with its bright scarlet large bracts resembling stars, has already become an indispensable attribute of the Christmas holidays, along with the traditional Christmas tree, garlands of colored lights, sparkling toys and gifts.

Poinsettia is one of the most spectacular species of the genus Euphorbia pulcherrima. Most often we buy a flowering plant in a store (and we must make sure that it is packaged very well, since the cold is destructive for it). Bright large bracts are bracts around small nondescript flowers, collected in complex inflorescences - umbrellas, which we mistake for flowers. They are red, orange, cream, white at the ends of numerous shoots.

The appearance of such plants immediately creates a festive atmosphere in the house, which you want to keep longer. How to care for poinsettia so that every Christmas a new star blooms in your home? This requires some knowledge and patience to provide the beauty with a special temperature and light conditions.

First of all, at the time of flowering, you need to provide the poinsettia with a bright place (on a windowsill, a special stand, under a lamp). Lack of lighting causes the colored bracts to fall off. The soil in the pot must be kept in a moderately moist state, avoiding overdrying or stagnant water, in order to keep the plant roots healthy.

At the end of flowering, the poinsettia enters a dormant period, which lasts until April - May. The bush is cut, leaving stems 10 cm high, placed in a cool (12-14 ° C), dark place. The soil is kept almost dry, but not overdried. Some leaves fall off, and this is normal.

In late March - early April, dormant buds start to grow, so the plants are transferred to larger containers in a fresh neutral substrate, watering is intensified, spraying begins, and the air temperature is raised to 20 - 25 ° C. 4 - 5 strong shoots are left on the bush, the rest are removed and used for cuttings. Fed with full fertilizer for growth every two weeks.

When 6 - 7 leaves appear on young shoots, they are cut off by 10 - 12 cm (4 - 5 leaves), put in warm water for several minutes to eliminate the outflow of milky juice (poisonous!), And the cuttings are planted in a mixture of peat and sand (1: 1) in small pots for rooting.

For successful rooting, heat is required (the temperature of the pan where the cuttings are located must be at least 24 ° C) and constant air humidity, which is achieved by regular spraying. Callus is formed on the 12th - 14th day, roots - on the 20th - 25th day. A mini greenhouse can be set up from a backlit aquarium, and a lamp under its bottom will provide bottom heating.

The mother plant is kept in the same warm humid atmosphere, the growing strong shoots are cut again into cuttings. The result is a well-branched, beautiful poinsettia bush that will bloom by December.

Young rooted plants are planted in pots 9-10 cm in size in a fertile mixture and kept at a temperature of at least 20 ° C. At the end of August, pinch the tops of the shoots to get bushes with 2 - 3 stems. They are fed with full flowering fertilizer (uniflor-bud) every 10 - 14 days.

For abundant flowering, poinsettia should receive 12-hour daylight hours until mid-September, while using additional luminescence with fluorescent lamps. From the beginning of October, within eight weeks, flower buds are laid on a short day (but not less than 10 hours). The air temperature at this time is maintained within the range of 20 - 22 ° C, the plants are regularly sprayed.

Flowering usually occurs at the end of November and continues by cultivars until mid-January. Experts consider it advisable to reduce the air temperature to 16 ° C two weeks before flowering to enhance the color intensity and increase plant resistance. Temperature control must be very precise - already at 15 ° C, the plant can shed leaves and damage the roots.

Cutting poinsettia can stand in a vase for up to two weeks, only you need to immediately place the ends of the stems in hot water (60 ° C) and immediately put the flowers in a vase with cold water.

Euphorbia is the most beautiful - a magnificent perennial plant that requires attention and care, but gives extraordinary beauty in the middle of snow and blizzards.