Growing rue: planting and care in the garden

It is difficult to imagine that someone does not know about such a plant as root.

Its history goes back several thousand years, and all this time it was widely used in traditional medicine and in everyday life.

Now this flower is actively used in cooking, pharmaceuticals, and also some antidotes are prepared from it. It occupies a place of honor in the modern folk medicine.

However, we already began to forget that this plant is a great guest in your flower bed. The perennial grass of the root will wonderfully grow and smell in your area if you take a little care and attention when planting and then caring for the flower. And how best to do it - read below.

Ruta fragrant: description of the plant

Let's see what is this rue. This plant is a long-lived shrub, with a very peculiar odor, which not everyone may like. In the European territory, in the wild, the rue does not grow, so it can only be found behind the fence by a gardener.

The height of the bush is about 55-70 cm with a woody trunk and lower parts of the branches. Every year, non-stiffened shoots die out, and in severe winters the entire upper part of the rue can die (with the arrival of spring, it is completely restored from the root). The color of the woody parts of the plant is rich yellow, and the leaves and the rest are green with a light gray tint.

In the summer, neat bright yellow flowers appear and if you take a good look, you will see pale dots in the light - microrests with essential oil. In our latitudes, the flower of the rue lives a lot, and, more often, it feels great until the age of twenty.

Choosing a place for rue on the garden plot

Fragrant Ruta is an unpretentious plant in terms of planting and care. Soil is not particularly important for him, so you can safely plant rue almost anywhere in your front garden. However, one of the important moments when planting an odorous shrub is the absence of drafts (protection against them can be both natural and artificial). Due to its ornamental, lace-shaped leaves, the rue is often planted for border decoration.

Requirements for soil for planting

Garden Ruta is a great lover of calcareous, loamy and crushed stone soils in which she feels best. The plant is sufficiently resistant to droughts and does not tolerate strong soil moisture. Before spring planting, even in the fall, it is necessary to deeply dig the site and it is desirable to apply fertilizer in the form of humus. In spring, the earth can be loosened and dredged to a shallow depth. The shrub is not whimsical to the conditions of the soil and can live in one place for 5-6 years, while maintaining excellent flowering.

What should be the lighting for the rue, where to plant the plant

Lighting for the rue, in the place where you are going to grow it,should be sufficient for normal development, but in the hottest time of the day, preferably a shade pritenyat a couple.

However, if for a rue to create a constant penumbra or a little more blackout, the leaves of the plant will begin to curl and turn yellow. So boldly, you can plant a flower in any place where direct sunlight falls.

How to plant rue: scheme and timing of planting

It is possible to plant garden grass with odorous flowers in several ways: seed, by grafting or dividing the bush.

According to the rules, the plant must first be grown on seedlings in pots, and only after that it should be planted in open ground.

Of course, the seeds can be sown immediately into the soil, but at the same time the consumption of seed material will increase, and you can only achieve decoration from the plant next year. When planting, it is also important to leave room for the growth of the rue, although with the observance of the 60x60 cm scheme, this is easy to do.

If you decide to grow seedlings, the seeds must be planted in early winter. In the open ground they are sown with the arrival of spring, and picking seedlings or cuttings should be engaged in the first days of summer.

Reproduction rue seminal method

The most convenient and popular method of rooting is considered to be its cultivation from seeds, therefore, in order to learn more about the root, and to find out in detail what kind of plant we are, we recommend to begin acquaintance with it from seed propagation. If the flower is already growing on your site, and you have collected its seeds, or your friends have shared with you, they can be planted on seedlings at the beginning of winter, because they will take root only after a few months.

For seedling growth, prepare a substrate of leafy earth and humus with a little sand. The depth of sowing seeds should not exceed two centimeters. The soil should always be kept slightly hydrated, and it doesn't matter if you grow seedlings in a greenhouse or on a windowsill (the first shoots will appear in a few weeks).

It is better to plant the root immediately in separate containers, but The plant can easily transfer several picks.

Routas are transplanted to the site as soon as all threats of frost have passed: usually, this time falls at the end of May and the beginning of June.

Cutting of the rue

If you decide not to sow fragrant rue, then there is another simple way to reproduce it - grafting. First you need to prepare the cuttings, which are removed in early spring from last year's increments. After cutting, they are placed in a container with water for further rooting.

In the water, the branches of rue rooted for about one month, and the tank should always be in a warm place. Then, the cuttings are planted in open ground or substrate for further growth of the roots.

If you put the cutting in the pot, then in 40 - 50 days it will be ready for picking on the site. But if you plant a sprig right in the open ground, you must cover it with a film and create light penumbra. In this case, rooting occurs in 50 - 60 days.

How to propagate the rue by dividing the bush

By dividing the bush, the rue is propagated in the spring or in the last month of summer. To do this, you need to dig a bush (preferably with a fork), inspect it for negative growths (if any, carefully cut them with a sharp knife), and then also carefully cut the rhizome. Split bush should be immediately planted in prepared pits, having previously fertilized them with compost. The root should be immersed to the same depth as it was before.

Growing rue, flower care features

Ruta does not need close attention. Just give her enough sunshine and do not overwet the soil - that's all the basic needs of a southern flower. Plant transplantation is needed very rarely (sometimes it happens once every ten years), but protection from drafts must be constant. The plant is rarely attacked by diseases and pests, and its main enemy is weeds. Do not forget to weed the fragrant rue in time and loosen the ground in the area where it grows. It is also worth considering the fact that even though the plant is accustomed to our winters, it is best to shelter it for the time of cold weather.

How to water the rue

Ruta is a fairly drought-resistant flower, so it only needs extra hot days for watering. Any overmoistening of the soil can lead to diseases and partial death of the plant. Also, an extra event will be spraying the flower.

Features feeding plants

After winter, you can cut dead branches and fertilize the root with a weak nitrogen fertilizer, although in general, the plant does not need special fertilizer. You can feed it only once a year, using for this purpose complex formulations.

Pruning rue

Ruta responds very well to pruning. After the cold and you have released the plant from the winter shelter, you need to cut dead shoots to the buds. You can also remove weak and old shoots. If the plant is very neglected, it will be beneficially affected by deep pruning, in which only 15 to 20 cm of branches are left from the root. In addition, with the help of pruning, you can give the plant even more decorative and profitable to allocate a compact crown.

The toxicity of the rue

Despite its beauty, the described plant is quite poisonous. Therefore, using the root as a spice, to create some drugs, as well as in the treatment of traditional methods, do not forget that in large doses the plant can be very dangerous.

If the juice gets on the skin, there is a risk of getting burns and even dermatitis. This means that with any manipulation of fragrant rue you should always wear gloves.In addition, you should not take root (in particular, as a spice or as a medicinal plant) to pregnant women and people with stomach diseases.