What is Rhubarb? Varieties, planting and care

Despite the fact that this useful vegetable garden (the Buckwheat family) has been cultivated on the territory of our country since ancient times, many of our readers do not know what rhubarb is.

For the first time the cultivated plant brought to Russia a great Russian scientist-geographer, a traveler NM Przhevalsky from Southeast Asia. Later, the plant was found in the Far East, Siberia, and the Caucasus.

What is Rhubarb?

The correct culinary classification of this plant is difficult to give. Juicy petioles of its leaves, probably, should be attributed to leafy greens, although they taste very similar to apples. Yes, and they are used in cooking they are just like fruit: to make a filling for pies, compotes, jam.

The value of this plant also lies in the fact that it ripens in early spring, when the fruit and berry crops are only blooming in our gardens. Cultivated varieties of plants have a delicate taste of petioles, are characterized by precocity and yield.

But let's return to the main question of our article: what is rhubarb and why do gardeners for decades grow it on their plots? It is a herbaceous perennial plant (the Buckwheat family) with a powerful developed root. It includes a short elongated rhizome and large roots.

The stem is tall and powerful, reaching a height of three meters, covered with red specks. The rhubarb leaves, located at the roots, are very large, with numerous plates. The leaves on the stem are smaller. The rhubarb begins to bloom in early June with pink or white flowers. Fruits (brown nuts) mature within two weeks.

Its overground part dies in winter, but the rhizome can live on one site for decades. In natural conditions, the rhubarb grows in China in Tibet, the Far East, the foothills of Central and South Asia, the Caucasus.

A bit of history

Cultivated rhubarb a few millennia ago, and in Europe came in the Middle Ages from China. Caravans carried dried roots of the plant, which called the "yellow root". They were used in folk medicine for the treatment of many diseases. In addition, the roots were used as a natural colorant.

Nowadays rhubarb is grown to produce tasty and healthy petioles, especially popular in European countries for the sake of curative rhizomes, and also used as a beautiful ornamental plant in landscape design.

Harvesting rhubarb

With proper care and proper planting, the rhubarb grows leaf mass until the fall, but this is a seasonal product. Petioles of the earliest varieties are eaten from the beginning of the regrowth to the middle of June, late varieties can be used until the middle of July. Then they become sinewy, hard, tasteless, besides they accumulate organic acids.

Fans of rhubarb can prepare stalks in the form of marmalade, compote, marinade, jam.

Beneficial features

Rhubarb is rich in mineral and pectin substances, vitamins. It is a dietary product in which there is practically no fat. Rhubarb has an easy diuretic effect, increases the secretory activity of the stomach, improves blood composition. Rhubarb is useful for improving the skin condition.

Types of Rhubarb

Nowadays in the gardens and in the gardens there are both cultivated varietal forms of plants, as well as wild, species. The latter are attractive decorative, unpretentious in care.

• Rhubarb officinalis. It differs in huge sizes: the leaves of the plant reach a length of 1.5 meters in length, and the peduncles exceed human growth.
• Rhubarb is a noble one. The plant forms a high "cob" consisting of large corrugated sheet plates.

• Rhubarb fingery. Its second name is Tangug. This species is interesting with strongly dissected bright leaves and crimson flowers, crowned by tall peduncles.
• Rhubarb Vegetable. This species is recommended as a garden plant. The cultivars of this species have juicy and thick petioles, with a pleasant taste, and they do not coarsen for a long time.

Rhubarb: varieties (most popular)

Today, there are more than a hundred varieties of this plant, but not all of them have spread in Russia.

• Variety Victoria - one of the earliest and yielding. It has a great taste. The length of the petioles does not exceed 60 centimeters. According to gardeners, the Victoria variety has a disadvantage - too abundant flowering.
• Moscow-42 is one of the earliest varieties with high yield and excellent taste. The length of the petioles is seventy centimeters, and their thickness is more than three centimeters. The petioles are smooth, green, and have a red band at the base.

• Ogre-13 is a high-yield medium-ripening variety. Excellent develops and forms petioles in the shade. The flesh of thick and long petioles is very tender and juicy. Two generative shoots are formed on the plant.
• Large - petalled - very early variety, which forms a powerful rosette of leaves, with petioles of dark red color. Their length is no more than 60 cm and a width of 2.5 cm. They have a pleasant taste and tender flesh.

• Gigantic - this sort refers to the late, which pleases the harvest, when the early varieties have already blossomed and coarsened. The petioles are huge, up to one meter long, with a thickness of up to four centimeters, in red.

Planting rhubarb

A place for planting a plant can be chosen almost any - it perfectly feels and in the penumbra, at farm buildings, between trees. Rhubarb frost and drought-resistant, because it has a powerful root system. But it is preferable if the soil under the bush is neutral, a little clay, so that the moisture that the rhubarb needs is better retained. Planting it is carried out after a good preliminary digging of the site, organic and complex fertilizers, ashes, are introduced into it.

Seeds to plant rhubarb are desirable in the winter immediately to a permanent place. They will germinate in the spring, as soon as a stable plus temperature is established. Germs are not afraid of short-term frosts to -7 ° C.

In one area, rhubarb can grow for dozens of years. But over time it thickens, the leaves become much smaller, the petioles lose their juiciness and sweetness. Therefore, vegetable varieties are desirable to be planted every ten years. This is a long time, so when planting a bush should be provided with nutrients for many years.

What do you need to know when planting a rhubarb?

Planting involves the presence of fairly large planting pits, almost the same as under the fruit seedlings: the depth is not less than 50 cm. They are filled with fertile soil and humus. In each pit it is necessary to add superphosphate and a handful of ash.

Care

After harvesting the bush is fed, pouring under it a bucket of humus with mineral fertilizers. In spring, the soil under the bush is only loosened, watered if necessary. In the spring, only decorative species can be fed, as their leaves and cuttings do not go into food.

Rhubarb is unpretentious in the care and easily tolerates small errors in agricultural technology. Care for this plant is fairly simple, to cope with it can and the beginner gardener. It involves the following activities:

• Loosening of soil in spring, after its warming-up;
• Autumn digging up of soil, up to 30 cm deep;
• Harvesting with breaking, rather than pruning stems;
• Pruning of the aboveground part of the plant at the onset of frosty days.

Top dressing

Care of the plant includes and carrying out fertilizing from the calculation:

• In autumn, not less than eight kilograms of organic fertilizers per square meter (peat compost or manure);
• In the spring, 30 grams of ammonium nitrate are added, which should be supplemented with potassium salt and superphosphate;
• Once a season you need to make the following composition under the bush: for ten liters of water, you should add a teaspoon (with a slide) of urea, a tablespoon of nitrosfos and 500 grams of mullein.

Reproduction

So, we found out what rhubarb is and how to grow it on the plot of land. It remains to tell how it can be multiplied if you need a larger number of useful and delicious petioles.

The rhubarb propagates by seeds and vegetatively. The second option involves the division of an adult bush (no more than five years old). This method is not recommended during flowering.

The bush is divided in spring or early autumn (before frost). Excavate the bush divided into several parts. For planting, a healthy root with two or three large apical buds, which are buried no more than two centimeters, will do.

If you prefer the reproduction of rhubarb seeds, then they should be soaked in water for ten hours. To collect the seeds from your bush, leave the most developed flower stem from a three-year-old plant. After the inflorescence becomes brown, the seeds can be collected and dried.