Do you like palm trees? Do you want to grow their likeness? Plant castor oil plant, popularly called castor oil, paradise tree, Turkish hemp.
As a cultivated plant, castor oil plant (Ricinus communis) was known in ancient times. Information about it is found in many literary sources of the ancient Greeks, Egyptians, Romans and Arabs. The plant is also mentioned in the Bible. Castor oil paintings adorned the walls of temples in Thebes.
Most botanists consider North and East Africa to be the birthplace of castor bean, where it still forms thickets on the coastal sands. From the coast, the castor-oil plant quickly settled inland. In Europe, interest in castor oil appeared only at the end of the 18th century, after the British brought seeds to London from their southern colonies.
Castor oil grows best and is most decorative in sunny, warm and humid places. She does not tolerate frosts and prolonged cooling, prefers areas with deeply cultivated, loose, nutritious soil, black soil.
In temperate climates, castor bean freezes and therefore is cultivated as an annual. It looks very exotic and leaves no one indifferent, due to which the popular name of the castor oil plant arose - the northern palm.
In Russia, the most widespread variety is Kazachka. It is a powerful branchy plant up to 2 meters high. The best known foreign varieties are Gibsonii and Impala with large bronze-colored leaves.
Large leaves are arranged alternately on long, hollow petioles. The leaf blade is smooth, colored dark green or red-violet, divided into several toothed segments along the edge of an elongated ovoid shape.
Bright red flowers with dark-colored stigmas are collected in racemose, rather dense inflorescences. Bolls are bright red, purple or carmine color, which persists until the seeds are fully ripe. Flowering lasts from August to September.
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Sowing castor bean
Castor bean is propagated by seeds, which are sown in pots in March or in May directly into the ground, 2-3 seeds per hole. Their germination rate is low. Seedling method of cultivation with sowing seeds in April is preferable.
Before sowing, scarification of seeds is desirable (mechanical violation of the integrity of the shell), which accelerates germination. It can be done by rubbing the seeds with sandpaper. After that, the seeds should be soaked for 12 hours in a growth stimulant solution, for example, in Epine-Extra or Zircon.
It is better to sow seeds in separate containers (at least 0.5 l) in disinfected soil to a depth of 3 cm. Sometimes, when germinating, a peel remains on the cotyledon leaves, it must be carefully removed after preliminary wetting.
Castor bean sprouts very powerfully, immediately shoots out shoots up to 5 cm high. The seedlings are immediately thinned out at a distance of 5 cm from each other, so that it is convenient to plant them later. When thinning, it is better not to pull out the excess, but to cut off with scissors.
With the appearance of the first true leaf, young specimens should be transferred to a cool, bright room to avoid stretching too much. Planting in a permanent place is possible only if you are sure that the period of possible frost is over. The earth lump must be preserved, it is not necessary to bury it.
The seedlings grow very quickly, and as soon as real leaves appear, the plants are transferred into separate containers. The containers should be two-thirds full so that as the seedlings grow, you can add earth when the seedlings begin to stretch.
Growing castor bean in the garden
Transplanting... Seedlings are planted in a permanent place after the end of the spring frost. Plants are planted in the ground with the preservation of an earthen coma, in nutritious loose soil, after watering the hole with hot water.
Growing conditions... Castor oil grows well and grows only in sunny places with cultivated nutritious air-permeable soil. Regular watering is necessary, especially during flowering and fruit formation. Fertilization, given the rapid growth, is simply necessary.
Care behind the castor oil plant, first of all, it consists in abundant watering. Regular weeding is required: at the initial stage of development, because Castor bean grows slowly and can be drowned out by weeds.
Top dressing... Periodic fertilizing with a mineral fertilizer containing nitrogen is also desirable. The assimilation of this nutrient is facilitated by a sufficient supply of moisture during the period from flowering to seed formation. Due to the slow initial growth, castor bean is easily drowned out by weeds, but seedlings grow well on clean soil even with a lack of water.
Castor oil plant in garden design
When using decorative castor bean, in order to make the beauty of plants more visible, it is better to plant them singly or use them as a background for flowering plants. And to make the beauty of the plants more visible, the distance between the plants is made within the range of 1 to 3 meters.
The castor oil plant is grown in gardens as a fast-growing ornamental plant. In mixed groups, it does not give the desired effect.
Castor oil plant is especially good as a tapeworm. In a large area, you can plant three plants in a triangle against the background of the lawn, forming a "tropical island". In this case, both the picturesque structure of the castor oil plant and the interesting outlines of its large leaves stand out most clearly.
But regardless of where you live, the castor oil plant constantly collects admiring glances and looks like a real queen of the garden.
Attention! All parts of the castor bean are poisonous, so it is necessary to work with it with gloves. If the family has small children, then it is safer to contemplate this beauty in pictures.
"Ural gardener", No. 43, 2017
