What happens sea buckthorn, planting and caring for it, especially breeding - all this I will tell you in this article. The valuable medicinal qualities of this culture are today known throughout the world. Sea buckthorn is grown, cultivated, medical and cosmetic preparations, as well as all kinds of culinary delights, are made on its basis. All parts of sea buckthorn have medicinal value, are used in folk and official medicine. Depending on the place of planting and the departure of sea buckthorn, it can be a low, sprawling shrub or a powerful tall tree.
Photo of sea buckthorn:
Where sea buckthorn grows
In the wild, it grows on rocky and sandy soils, in river valleys, near streams, reservoirs, on seashores. Because of this, it is often called the sea thorn, sand berry, dune thorn. The birthplace of sea buckthorn is the highlands of the Himalayas. Where does sea buckthorn grow in Russia? You can answer - everywhere, except in the regions of the Far North. Today, this culture is spread around the world. This is a representative of the sucker family. Through the efforts of breeders, many of its varieties have been bred.
Where and how wild buckthorn grows, photo:
Features, how to distinguish male from female sea buckthorn, photo
On our domestic open spaces its name is explained quite easily - the branches of the tree are abundantly strewn, covered with bright orange fruits on all sides. The leaves are narrow, elongated, with a gray hue, the flowers are so inconspicuous that at first glance they are easily mistaken for leaves. As already mentioned, depending on the variety, sea buckthorn can be short or tall.
When does sea buckthorn bloom? Toward the very beginning of May or closer to its middle, small short tassels bloom on the branches, in each of them there are 3-5 small flowers of a yellowish tint. Flowers bloom first, leaves follow them.
Here it is necessary to mention one feature of sea buckthorn - only female representatives blossom, on male trees there are stamens collected in a bunch. On these stamens there is pollen, which is easily transferred by the wind to female inflorescences, as a result of which pollination occurs. If you slightly disturb the flowering male branch, you can see a cloud of this same pollen. Sea buckthorn flowers have no aroma, therefore they do not attract bees.
How sea buckthorn blooms, photo:
In order to get a good harvest, it is necessary to plant male and female trees together. Fruits give only female plants, male are only pollinators. For pollination, sometimes one male representative is enough, which can grow at a considerable distance (up to 50 meters) from female specimens. Windy weather contributes to the process.
Sea buckthorn female and male: the difference is that the male tree can grow even from wild growth. But as for the female plant, it should be cultural sea buckthorn. As mentioned above, the floor of the tree is determined by the appearance of the kidneys. The male variety is easiest to identify in spring or autumn, the female one can be easily identified in the summer, when the tree blooms and bears fruit. Female kidneys are much smaller in size than male ones, covered with a pair of scales. Male buds are larger, voluminous, have from 5 to 7 cover flakes.
The male sex of sea buckthorn is on the right, the female is on the left, photo:
When does the sea buckthorn season begin? When does sea buckthorn ripen? From the last weeks of August to the beginning of October, depending on the climate in the growing region. However, there are some nuances here: the collection time depends on the purpose for which you need berries. For freezing or eating fresh sea-buckthorn, you should collect the fruits at the very beginning of their ripening (late calendar summer – early fall). By this time, they are already saturated with vitamins, but firm enough to the touch, do not ooze juice. If the berries are needed for oil, cooking all kinds of jams, jams, sauces, then you should wait until they fully ripen. Ripe fruits are filled with juice, slightly soft.
Why is it difficult to collect sea buckthorn?
This task is quite difficult, the process can be traumatic due to the sharp spines that cover the branches. Sea buckthorn has rather short stalks, and ripe berries are soft to the touch, easily wrinkle under the fingers. In addition, the fruit juice is very acidic and can cause irritation of the skin of the hands with prolonged contact. What to do in this case?
There are radical methods in which branches are pruned together with the fruits, but this is pretty cruel to the tree. Experienced gardeners have found a way out of this situation. To begin with, before harvesting, put on those clothes that will not be a pity to stain, but this will inevitably happen. The second rule - you need to collect the fruits from the top of the branch towards the bottom.
How to collect sea buckthorn:
- The first method is rough, in which the branches with the fruits are carefully cut and immediately frozen. Frozen berries are easily removed from the branches, but this method is suitable only for those cases when you need them frozen.
- The second method is manual, in the same way they collect cherries, cherries, apricots and other fruits. It is traumatic, takes a lot of time, requires increased attention.
- The third method is “skillful hands”, i.e. production of auxiliary devices. Gardeners go to various tricks: they attach a sharp scraper to the long stick with electrical tape, which, as it were, combines berries from the branches. Your assistant should stand below and keep either an open bag or an open umbrella for picking berries. Sometimes they use a knife with a long handle and pick fruits according to the same principle. However, the “cobra” is considered the most convenient device - this is a popular name that has taken root among gardeners and summer residents. The device is a dense wire loop that is securely attached to a long holder. You can drill two holes at the end of a rounded stick and thread a wire through them. For convenience, the loop itself is slightly bent so that when viewed from the side, it resembled a cobra's hood. The top of the loop should be slightly narrowed. The fixing place must be securely wrapped with wire or wrapped several times with insulation tape. Now you can quite conveniently cut the stalks “cobra”, from below you can open the umbrella, where the berries will fall.
The method of collecting sea buckthorn "cobra" is the most acceptable, less traumatic.
You can also wait for the first frosts, spread a fabric or a piece of polyethylene under a tree, then arm yourself with a heavy stick and attack it with a trunk with branches. From the blows, the frozen fruits will separate from the branches and fall on the prepared cover. Decide for yourself - as you prefer.
Watch a few videos, maybe you will use the ideas of picking berries with devices that are easy to make yourself, with your own hands.
How to plant sea buckthorn correctly
Before planting, you need to determine the variety - the selected type of sea buckthorn should be adapted to the climate of your region. It is best to buy seedlings in proven places, for example, in fruit tree nurseries or in gardening institutes. Additionally, you will be assured of the purity of the variety. It should be borne in mind that this culture has a very short rest period so that the sea-buckthorn tree does not “wake up” in the middle of winter, choose those varieties that are designed for growing in your area.
When to plant sea buckthorn - in spring or autumn? Sea buckthorn seedlings can be planted with the advent of spring and autumn. But it is preferable to do this in early spring - so they better take root. If you plant a tree in the fall, then a sudden winter warming can provoke its awakening.
When choosing a place, give preference to zones near buildings, paths - away from areas where active gardening is in full swing. The fact is that sea buckthorn has cord-shaped roots that are located in the upper layers of the soil (about 50 cm). They are quite long, can diverge to the sides at a distance of more than 10 meters. Thus, the roots can be damaged during digging, they are very sensitive, so even with the slightest injury, sea buckthorn can get sick. In general, digging soil near this tree is not recommended, even if you do it carefully. Digging provokes the appearance of shoots, especially in places of "touched" roots. Light loosening of the hoe will be enough. For this light-loving culture, choose open, unshaded places.
Since the autumn, do not be lazy to add sand with humus mixed in equal amounts (2 kg / 1 m² or per each hole) to the appointed place, phosphorus-potassium additives are also relevant.
How to plant sea buckthorn female and male together, at what distance? If there are several trees, then the distance between them should be about 2-3 meters. Must be present male sea buckthorn (for pollination). As mentioned above, for 5-6 female trees, 1 male specimen is enough. The process itself is no different from the planting of other fruit representatives: the pit should be about 70 × 70 × 70 cm, at the bottom you need to form a small hill, carefully spread the roots along its slopes.
After this, the pit is covered with soil just above the root neck. After shrinkage of the soil, the neck should be flush with the soil level. After planting, a wide hole is formed around the tree, which needs to be filled with water in an amount of about two buckets.
How to care for sea buckthorn
Care of seedlings consists in regular watering, you should be aware that sea buckthorn is a moisture-loving culture. When a sapling grows stronger and becomes a tree, then it no longer needs to be watered too often, only during a drought. It does not make sense to add top dressing to the near-stem circle because the cord-like root system of the tree diverges to the sides and extends for many meters. When sea buckthorn begins to bear fruit, it can be fed with organic and mineral fertilizers, once every 3 years (4-5 kg of humus per 1 m², 20-30 potassium-phosphorus additives).
Sea buckthorn, photo:
You should also carefully remove weeds in the area of the near-stem circle, do not loosen the soil too actively (without going deeper than 7-10 cm). Pruning of branches and crown formation is best done in spring, before the buds have bloomed.
After the sea buckthorn tree is 8 years old, you can practice anti-aging pruning - remove old branches, preferring three-year-old shoots. Dried, frozen, diseased fragments must also be removed.
How to propagate sea buckthorn?
The process is carried out using layering, shoots and seeds. It is impractical to describe the seed method in detail, since this method takes too much time. The resulting plants do not inherit the varietal qualities of the mother tree, most often it turns out a "wild". Often, sea buckthorn is propagated by seeds in the laboratory to obtain new varieties, hybrids.
In the case of overgrowth, young sea buckthorn inherits all the features of the main tree. Selected representatives are regularly watered in the spring and especially in the summer. With the advent of new spring, the process is carefully cut with a small fragment of the root, and then planted in a separate place of residence.
How to propagate sea buckthorn layering? It is necessary to select those branches that are closest to the ground. In the spring near these branches make small indentations in the soil (about 10 cm). Branches are bent and pinned to the ground with wire brackets. When these branches sprout, the pinned spot is sprinkled with soil. The next year, again, with the advent of spring, they are dug up, cut off with the help of secateurs and transferred to a permanent place of residence or to grow.
The most high-quality and productive method of propagation is the cuttings method. Cuttings of sea buckthorn are no different from the cuttings of other fruit trees - everything happens in a similar way. Around the middle of summer, cut a beautiful and strong stalk (approximately 15-20 cm in length), pinch off the three lower leaves, treat the cut point with Kornevin (optional). Dig the end of the stem into nutrient soil, a substrate, or moist moist vermiculite. A mixture of clean river sand, fertile soil and peat is perfect. From above, cover the handle with a transparent plastic glass to make something like a greenhouse.
In the room where the cuttings germinate, the air temperature should be approximately +26 .. + 28 ° C. Young livestock should be regularly watered, irrigated with a spray gun, periodically ventilated (raise the glass). After about 8 weeks, the coating is removed, the stalk is fed with potassium-phosphorus additives. The coating is no longer used, the seedling is watered and waiting for a new spring. When it gets stronger, it is transferred to a permanent place of growth.
Sometimes in garden forums one may come across the following question - why sea buckthorn does not bear fruit? The answer is really simple: sea buckthorn is a dioecious culture, in order to produce fruits, it is necessary to have male and female specimens in one area. If you have only "girls" growing up, then they will not bear fruit. "Boys" do not bear fruit at all, but are only pollinators. To solve the problem in the spring, you can plant a couple of shrubs of the opposite sex on the site. It is best to choose the cultural male varieties "Alei" or "Gnome". Just in case, it is better to immediately plant two male trees, if one suddenly dies or freezes in winter.
Vaccination also gives good results. You can take several branches from a healthy tree of the opposite sex (for example, from a neighbor in the country) and with the advent of spring, plant them on your sea buckthorn.
Varieties of sea buckthorn, description, photo
For a good harvest, large and juicy berries, choose only the best types of sea buckthorn that are adapted to grow in your area. Take cuttings from a "proven" tree or purchase in a nursery with good recommendations. High-quality berries of sea buckthorn are always large, have a pleasant taste, juicy, do not burst in the hands, abundantly cover the branches of a tree.
Variety Krasnoplodnaya - red sea buckthorn photo:
The universal variety Moscow Beauty is characterized by medium productivity, the bush grows up to two and a half meters, from mid-summer to early autumn it bears fruit in large (up to 10 g) juicy berries.
Sea-buckthorn Chuiskaya is characterized by a sweeter taste, the branches of the tree are not too densely covered with thorns, the thorns themselves are not long, the size of the fruits is slightly smaller than that of the Moscow Beauty, but larger than average.
Sea-buckthorn Red-fruited has reddish berries, which becomes clear from the name, resistant to disease, is characterized by vitality and unpretentiousness.
Sea buckthorn Elizabeth belongs to the classic varieties, abundantly bears fruit, berries have a pleasant sweetish taste, large size. Description of Elizabeth's sea-buckthorn: it is a very winter-hardy cultivar, resistant to diseases, ripens a little later than the rest of the species, reaches medium size.
Variety Chuiskaya, photo:
Botanical sea buckthorn is more convenient to collect, since its peduncle is slightly longer than other species. To obtain valuable sea buckthorn oil, this species is most often grown.
The Giant variety fully lives up to its name, the tree grows up to 3-4 meters in height, the fruits are large in size, and the branches are practically not covered with thorns. That is, the Giant variety is a sea buckthorn without thorns.The variety is winter-hardy, the berries ripen by September.
Sea buckthorn Beloved is another common varietal species in our vastness. It is distinguished by large sweet berries on long stalks, it is easy to collect, it does not wrinkle under the fingers, the bushes are quite sparse, which optimizes the harvest process (easy access to the berries). This variety is winter-hardy, unpretentious, abundantly fruiting.
In addition to medicinal value, this culture can act as an element of landscape design on your site. Its long roots, like ropes, hold the soil perfectly. With its help, you can form a hedge, and in company with the rest of the bushes, it will look very harmonious.
Whatever your side, sea buckthorn is good for everyone - landing and caring for it will not be a burden to you, since it is unpretentious, incredibly useful and looks beautiful on the site.