Echinacea. Cultivation

What is this miracle plant of Echinacea, the cultivation of which is of interest not only from the decorative point of view?

Echinacea (old name - rudbeckia purple), is a perennial plant with beautiful flowers that resemble large chamomiles. In addition to the traditional pink and crimson color, in modern breeding species Echinaceus you can find orange, yellow and white flowers. The American Indians also discovered the healing power of this plant, which helps prevent many diseases. Therefore echinacea, the cultivation of which they began to control by cultivation, became for them a real remedy.

Echinacea belongs to the family of Compositae plants, its home is North America. In nature, echinacea grows wild plant mainly on the field, limestone heath, stony hill, in the dry steppe and light forest. Its jagged, green leaves have an oval-narrow shape, with a more often occurring pubescent surface on which veins can be seen. You can also meet this plant with a purple tint at the base of the stem. Large-sized flowers, the appearance of which occurs on stiff, straight stems, reaching a height of one and a half meters, have a beam arrangement of petals, on which there is a cone-shaped protruding bristled core. Thanks to this core (flower stalk) Echinacea in ancient Greece was called a hedgehog. A large dark rhizome Echinacea is edible and has a sharp taste.

The genus Echinacea has no more than nine species, of which only a few species (purple, pale and narrow-leaved species) are grown for use in medicinal medicinal purposes. For these purposes, a rhizome is suitable, but the head of the flower is also used. Also sometimes used for the preparation of various medical solutions with seeds and juice of the plant. So, echinacea is often used as an immunostimulant compound medicine, as well as as an integral part of medicines in the treatment of influenza, colds, inflammations and infections.

Echinacea. Cultivation

The question will be relevant, but how to grow Echinacea? If you want to enjoy the presence of decorative echinacea in your home greenhouse, you need to grow only kinds of purple and strange echinacea, as only they are hybrid varieties of our modern plants that can grow at home.

The flowering of this plant falls for the period from July to mid-October. By attracting to their flowers a large number of pollen gatherers, such as bees, it is capable of producing excellent healing qualities from its pollen. Echinacea, the cultivation of which does not cause special difficulties, prefers to grow in weakly alkaline soil, less often it can require moisture-permeable soil. It is capable of growing on open sunny or sheltered from the light of the semi-shady places. Echinacea can adapt to rain, arid, frosty conditions and can feel good on poor soils.

Also not at all afraid of pests and diseases Echinacea. Cultivation from seeds passes relatively quickly, so after planting, as a rule, in the spring, it can blossom after two years. Optimum temperature of seed growth is considered to be a temperature not exceeding thirteen degrees Celsius. If you prefer simple methods of reproduction, then it will be enough to dig a plant and, after dividing the rhizome, transplant it. Do this in the early spring or late autumn. The division of the roots of sufficiently adult plants should occur once every three to four years. It should also be added that samosev allows the plant to reproduce itself.

If you remove the discolored heads, then even the beginnings of fading Echinacea will prolong your bloom. Growing it, as you can see, is not at all difficult, and the benefits are enormous.