Lakonos: flowers are plain, and the fruits are attractive

Lakonos is a genus of plants belonging to the family of the lakonos. It is also called phytolacca (Phytolacca). It has several national names: lentil berries, fatty grass, Kermes berries, Jewish ivy. Recently spread to the Ciscaucasia and Transcaucasia as a weed. His homeland is North America. In garden design, only one of the 25 species belonging to this family is used: the lakonos is ten-tychin, or the American one.

It is a herbaceous large perennial with an aerial part dying for the winter. The fine greenish-white flowers of the Lakonos are collected in racemose erect dense inflorescences about 15 cm long and about 2 cm in diameter. The core rhizome extends deep into the soil for 0.5 m or more. The height of the plant with thick stems is about 2 m. Leaves are up to 20 cm long, light green (in autumn with a reddish tint), oval-oblong, regular, with distinctly prominent streaks of yellowish color.

Lakonos flowers blossoms in July and pleases them with gazes until the end of August. Approximately in mid-September, berries begin to ripen. At first they are green, later they turn dark red, almost black. At a time when berries are ripening on the plant, it is very decorative, and the dark "buttons" sparkling in the sun and beckon them to try them.

All parts of the plant lakonos (flowers, berries, leaves, roots) are poisonous. They contain tannins and saponins in large quantities, it is impossible to taste the original cones. And if there are small children, then put on your site phytolacus is not worth it, because to see the sorvants so difficult, they all strive to put in their mouths, and deaths, unfortunately, are known.

Seeds ripen by October. They are small, about 3 mm, black with metallic luster. Flighting, they can sprout in the most inappropriate places. Attempts to transplant the lakonos flowers these carry poorly and often die. However, in this place a couple of years later they can grow again.

Phytolacca is a shade-tolerant plant, but it grows much better on sunny areas. It prefers cultivated soils, but it can grow on any, but too acidic. Thanks to the powerful fleshy roots, the plant is able to extract water, however, in hot weather it is advisable to water it abundantly. Can suffer only from Spring and autumn frosts, but recovered quickly. For winter, the above-ground part must be cut off, and the root should preferably be covered, for example by a layer of humus, peat or garden soil.

Propagation is preferably the seeds of the Lakonos. Flowers can appear in the first year of cultivation. Freshly harvested seeds without cleansing from the pulp are best sowed under winter to a shallow depth (about 2.5 cm). When storing seeds in a dry place, their germination after six months only increases. Strongly grown rhizome can be divided into parts in such a way that on each piece there are buds of renewal. The procedure is best done in early spring.

Laconos, whose flower is unattractive (but interesting "cobs with cones"), is a citizen of the world. It is good for him where there is space, it does not matter whether the mountain village is a metropolis. Demonstrate himself, he is capable of mixed plantings (in the background of flower beds), and in solitary.