Japanese Cryptomeria - a unique plant

Japan and China - the birthplace of an evergreen tree with the name Japanese cryptomeria. Residents of the Land of the Rising Sun consider it their national tree. In natural conditions it grows on the northern slopes of mountains and plains. It is planted in forest plantations, it is decorated with park alleys.

Description of the plant

Japanese cryptomeria is a plant known from ancient times.

The age of the tree reaches 150 years, its height can be 60 meters or more. The trunk in the girth may have two or more meters. Japanese cryptomeria is distinguished by a very dense crown of light or dark green color.

On the tree grow male and female spikelets.

The crown is formed in the form of a regular pyramid. The bark has a brown color with a reddish tinge. During growth, the crust exfoliates with long, narrow strips.

Cultural forms of wood can have a green crown with a yellowish or reddish tinge. The shoots on the branches are flexible, covered with fine hard needles with pointed tips and very small globular fruit-cones with a brown tinge. Their diameter does not exceed 2 cm, there are fruits at the end of the shoot. They ripen in the first year and are released from seeds with the onset of autumn.

The tree, as already mentioned, has female and male spikelets growing at the ends of the tree shoots. Male spikelets with stamens in the form of scales have an oval shape, they are arranged in a spiral. On the underside of the spikelet there are dusty sacs.

Female spikelets in the base are covered with leaves in the form of scales. They are almost completely obstructed at the base. Coating and seed scales have up to five ovules.

Japanese cryptomeria breeds with seeds, cuttings, graft, sprouts. In natural conditions, trees grow very quickly, which contributes to their popularity not only in China and Japan.

Regions of cultivation of cryptomeria

Cryptomeria of the kipreyny family attracts attention with its natural beauty. In the middle of the XIX century, it began to be cultivated in Europe.

To date, Japanese cryptomeria has given life to a variety of varieties. There are cultures for greenhouses, various indoor facilities, including for growing in a room.

Breeder-bred Japanese cryptomeria (a photo often found in gardening magazines) is also used to decorate a house.

Garden forms of an evergreen beauty are especially common in areas with a mild subtropical climate. In Russia, the plant is popular in the Crimea and the Caucasus. Fluffy trees of beautiful pyramidal form adorn parks, gardens, greenhouses in these regions.

German gardeners have grown over 20 varieties of this unique plant. Among them are winter-resistant varieties. However, a temperature of 10-12 degrees below zero for these forms of cryptomeria evergreen represents a rather difficult test.

Dwarf varieties do not exceed a height of two meters, there are domestic species with a height of not more than 1.5 m. Cultivate such crops mainly as kadchnye.

Evergreen Cryptomerism in Home Collections

For such an exotic evergreen plant, like the Japanese cryptomeria, care at home is needed thorough. The following conditions are necessary for him:

• Good lighting. You need a bright room without access to direct sunlight.
• The temperature in summer should not be above 15 ^° C, and in winter - about 8-10 ° C. The room in which Japanese cryptomeria grows should be ventilated regularly, avoiding drafts.
• An evergreen home plant needs frequent watering during its active vegetation - from spring to late autumn. In winter, watering is reduced. With the onset of frosts, home cryptery is not watered at all. To the plant harmful excess water, which is not absorbed by the roots. After watering, you should remove excess water.
• Japanese cryptomeria is a moisture-loving culture, when a drought occurs, the plant begins to shed its needles. If the room is dry air, cryptometry should be sprayed frequently using a spray gun.
• During the active spring and summer vegetation, the plant needs feeding. To do this, fertilizers are used for indoor plants, diluted in water, designed for irrigation. It should be alternated top dressing with conventional fertilizers with the addition of organic.
• Dwarf trees growing at home should be transplanted every five years. They start the transplant in the spring, before the beginning of the active vegetation. The soil for planting cryptomeria is a mixture of equal parts of compost, leaf land and river sand. Good drainage is required.
• At home, cryptomery is propagated by cuttings and seeds. The stalk taken from a young, not lignified plant shoot, must be treated with heteroauxin or preparations on its basis and planted in prepared soil. Covering the stalk with a film, it is watered, keeping the wet surface of the upper layer until rooting.

The seed method of reproduction is also used. Seeds are planted in a box, sprinkled with soil, moisturize its surface and cover with glass. Planted seeds are regularly watered. The temperature of the environment in the greenhouse is maintained somewhat higher.

Features of growing a plant

Young shoots, grown from cuttings and seeds, you need to pinch. Perform this procedure regularly, forming the plant in such a way that the shoots, growing from the trunk and skeletal branches, were removed.

With the onset of spring, severely exposed areas should be cut off. The branches of cryptomeria in the period of its growth should be tied with string to form the direction of growth. Cryptomeria Japanese nursing requires from the first days of growth. Only then can you get a really beautiful dwarf semblance of an ancient giant.

Diseases and pests of plants

Cryptomeria Japanese at home can get sick, so a thorough examination of the tree is necessary.

It can damage the red spider mite, scab. The affected plant begins to dry out, lose pine needles. It is greatly weakened.

The main measures to save cryptoremia: removal and destruction of affected parts of the plant followed by treatment with fungicide.