Dogwood - planting and care. Growing and reproduction of dogwood. Useful properties of cornelian

Dogwood, unfortunately, is not very common in our country. Nevertheless, this plant has unique properties, including medicinal properties. Therefore, it is worth thinking about how to grow it on your garden plot.

Planting a dogwood and its further cultivation is not such a difficult task. Even a beginning gardener will cope with this. This plant is very unpretentious and at the same time gives edible and tasty fruit. In our latitudes, most common dog common.

What does the dogwood look like?

Dogwood is a small bush or tree, about 2-5 meters high. The diameter of its trunk varies from five to forty-five centimeters.

In garden plots it is easy to grow bush cousin. Cultivation of the same tree is a little more difficult, however it is easy to form. By the way, a dogwood bush usually has several boles.

The trunk of the plants is even, the crown has a beautiful and compact pyramidal or round shape. The root system of the dogwood is very strong, it is not deep. The roots are in 20-120 centimeters from the soil surface.

There is no periodicity of fruiting in dogwood - the harvest is collected annually. That's why he needs constant recharge and good hydration. This article is for those who decided to grow dogwood. Planting and caring for this plant require special attention.

Corneal fruits

The dogwood fruit is a juicy drupe. A wild dogwood is distinguished by elliptical or cylindrical fruits. Photo from above - this is it. Domesticated plants also contain bottle-shaped, pear-shaped and oval fruits.

The color of the dogwood fetus may be pale, slightly reddish, or maybe almost black. There are also varieties of dogwood, in which the berries are yellow and pink in color.

Inside the fetus is a bone, which has an oval shape. The length of the stone is of the order of one to one and a half cm. There may be from one to three seeds in the bone.

Dogwood - planting and care

So, you decided to decorate your garden with this useful plant. It is best to pay attention to the common dogwood. Cultivation of this plant can be done in several ways. You can grow it from seeds, and you can use vegetative reproduction (spring inoculation with a cuttings and summer oculization with a sleeping eye, reproduction with lignified and green cuttings or layers).

Those who decided to breed a dogwood with the help of seeds, should remember - there is no guarantee that the motherhood will remain in the offspring. In those places where this plant is widely distributed, seed reproduction is mainly used to get rootstocks in vaccination reproduction.

In places with a colder climate, where the dogwood was not grown earlier, the seed propagation of this plant with numerous re-plantings is practiced. This allows you to select the most winter-hardy forms and get plants that are adapted to the special climate conditions. More stable seedlings can also be grown from seeds that are brought from more northerly places, where the dogwood grows. Planting and caring for them will be almost the same as for plants grown in warmer climates.

Reproduction by seeds

Growing dogwood from seeds is very difficult, as they hard to germinate, have a dense shell and have a deep rest. If you sow them in the fall, then in part they will germinate in the second year. Most of the seeds germinate only in the third and fourth year.

Seed planting of the dogwood begins with preseeding preparation and long stratification. If you have greenhouses, then you should use the method of seed stratification described below , in which the germination rate reaches 80%.

Seeds (necessarily freshly picked) are placed in boxes filled with wet sawdust, moss or sand. Prepared boxes put in a hotbed, pre-filled with manure. It is best to use a horse. The thickness of the layer of manure is 40 centimeters. From above, a layer of 10 centimeters, the earth is stacked.

Before laying seeds for stratification, it is necessary to soak them in water for three days in advance. It must be periodically changed - this will speed up the physiological processes necessary for germination. You can hold seeds for a while under running water. Due to this, dense shells will wash away substances that slow down germination.

The second way of seed reproduction

There is one more technique that allows you to grow from the seeds of dogwood bushes or trees. The fruits of the plant are placed in barrels or sacks and remain there until active fermentation begins. Later they are rubbed and washed. Bones obtained after stratification are mixed with sawdust and stored in a cold place for a year and a half. After this period, with the onset of spring, the seeds are planted in the ground. For the first year the seedlings grow to 3-4 centimeters. For the second - another 10-15 centimeters.

It should be noted that the seedlings will grow for a long time, and the plant will begin to bear fruit only after 7-10 years. Those who want to get useful berries quickly, choose other ways to grow cornel.

Reproduction by layers

Many do not know how to plant a dogwood, using layers. In fact, it's very easy. Branches that grow close to the soil surface should be bent and laid in a shallow ditch. Their tops are displayed outside.

To fix the branch on the bottom of the ditch, you can use hooks. After this, ditches need to be buried and watered all the time, while there is a period of growth. Bars are also made by soft wire to improve the rooting of branches at the point of inflection. In fact, in the same way, gooseberries, currants, etc., are also propagated.

Reproduction by lignified and green cuttings

Gardener amateurs should not get carried away by this method of reproduction of the dogwood, because for this it is necessary to have greenhouses in which fog is artificially formed. In addition, you need to use special growth substances. If all this is available, then this method will bring good results.

Reproduction by vaccination

This is the best way that an amateur can use so that dogwood saplings appear on his garden plot. Using it, you can get plants of various forms and a variety of cultivars. Each of them has its own unique properties. Seedlings are selected for inoculation for 2-3 years.

Care of the plant

Dogwood is very picky about the characteristics of the soil. Best of all, it grows on fertile soil, which has good loosening. It is necessary to water regularly dogwood. Planting and caring for this plant will require you to be attentive, especially at the first time. The soil around it should be covered with mown grass, peat or sawdust.

Watering dogwood, too, should be done correctly, only then you will harvest a rich harvest. Throughout the summer period the soil is watered regularly. As we have already said, the root system of this plant is shallow from the soil surface.

The positive quality of the dogwood - he likes slightly shaded places.

So, what you need to do to have a beautiful dogwood on your garden site? The photo above perfectly illustrates how a healthy and strong plant looks. It must be periodically fed with fertilizers, gently weeded and regularly watered. During the vegetation period, the dogwood is treated with nitrogen-phosphate fertilizers, closer to the autumn - potash (wood ash). Sometimes compost and humus are used. An important role is played by top dressing with lime, since this plant is vitally necessary for calcium.

Pruning plants

A distinctive feature of the dogwood is the possibility of forming both trees and bushes. Defining pruning must be done in the first years of its cultivation.

The stamping of seedlings should reach 50-70 centimeters in height. All shoots that occur below this level must be removed. Special pruning, which will help increase the amount of harvest, do not need to be carried out. Eliminate the branches thickening the crown.

Be sure to remember: the roots of this plant during weeding are very easy to damage. Soil is processed not deeper than 10-15 centimeters. If the soil is swampy or heavily soiled, the plant may die.

Cornelian Properties

This plant is an excellent honeycomb. In addition, it is a cure for a variety of diseases. In its fruits, vitamin C is more than in gooseberries, mountain ash and lemon. Berries of dogwood increase appetite, and also possess astringent, antipyretic and antiscorbutic properties.

The fruits of dogwood are used for prevention if there is a risk of lead poisoning or mercury poisoning. Pectins contained in them, bind harmful substances and contribute to their rapid removal from the human body.

A person suffering from gastrointestinal disorders should be given an infusion of berries from this plant, since they possess phytocidal and astringent properties.

From the fruits of a cornel, you can cook a very tasty jam or cook a compote. They can be combined with other fruits and berries. Eat berries and fresh - many people really like their unusual taste.

Afterword

Dogwood is a plant that will feed and heal, and will please the eye with a spring golden blossom, and will surprise with an autumn harvest.

So, if you properly protect the dogwood before winter and during the whole pore of cold weather, then you will not regret it.

I would like at the end of the article to give one medical prescription for which the fruits of this plant are used. He will help all suffering from hemorrhoids.

To begin with, you need to take a full glass of cornel bones without hurrying up. They can be diluted or used with apples, cabbage, potatoes, bread, meat, etc. You can take the bones not directly from the fruits, but use those that were stored before you or those that remained in the compote or jam. After this procedure, the problem will leave you in a week.

There are many other recipes that will help you get rid of annoying ailments. But in addition to the therapeutic effect, cornel berries have a tonic effect. Accretion of the fruits of this plant can prevent the emergence of many unpleasant diseases and will become an additional source of vital energy.