A garden plant is often called jasmine, but this jasmine is not real. Its correct name is "chubushnik", and it belongs to a completely different botanical family. It is united with real jasmine by a pleasant, rather strong aroma, apparently, that is why we associate mock-orange with real jasmine.
Real jasmine (olive family) is a thermophilic plant that grows in the tropics and subtropics. In the wild, it can be found in Asia and the Arabian Peninsula. In shape, it is a liana (Jasmine multiflorous or Jasmine officinalis), or a shrub with liana-like shoots (Jasmine arabian - sambac).
Sambac jasmine has been growing in my house for many years, it does not require special attention to itself and is content with little. At the same time, it blooms magnificently every year, delighting with its aroma. The stalk, planted many years ago, has turned into a lignified "stump" about 6 cm high, from which green liana-like shoots with opposite bright green leathery leaves on short petioles extend in different directions. In late winter - early spring, shoots must be heavily pruned. This stimulates the growth of young twigs and promotes stronger flowering. The branches of the sambac are very flexible, so it needs a support in the form of a decorative lattice, on which you can attach the shoots with special clips (or a simple string), twisting them at your discretion. My jasmine lives in an insulated loggia all year round. Its shoots are kept on ordinary linen cords, stretched 30 cm from the ceiling. Over the summer, he twists around the supports so that it seems as if you are in a real green gazebo.
In early May, the first flower "tassels", consisting of 3-6 buds, appear on the newly grown young branches. As a rule, the flowers open sequentially: when the first flower has already changed its color from white to lilac (a signal that it will soon fall), the second blooms in full force, and the third just opens its petals, etc. You can tell that jasmine has bloomed by the strong scent that fills the room. They say this aroma invigorates more than coffee and serves as an antidepressant. And how good the famous English jasmine tea is! I collect the fallen flowers and put them in a tea pot. And no artificial flavors needed!
Despite the fact that jasmine grows quite strongly over the summer, it does not require a large capacity at all. For several years now, my plant has been content with a 1.5 liter pot. I transplant it every two years into a new land. During this period, the soil becomes heavily salted from our hard city water, the plant develops chlorosis (the leaves acquire an unhealthy light green tint, while the veins remain dark), jasmine blooms poorly, the branches are deformed.
I prepare the soil for transplanting by adding to the purchased peat turf soil or leaf humus, rotted coniferous litter (from a pine forest) and sand in a ratio of about 2: 1: 1: 1.
I take the plant out of the pot (I don't water it for a couple of days before so that the soil dries up slightly), shake off the old soil (but not completely) with a light tap on the earthen clod, examine the roots, cut out the obviously rotten and dried ones, and slightly shorten the healthy ones. I do this so that the jasmine does not grow very much. If you want to have a huge jasmine bush (and the apartment allows it), you can not cut the roots, but simply transplant the plant into a larger pot, replacing the earth.
After transplanting, I water the plant well so that the new soil fits snugly to the roots.
Like any representative of the tropics, Sambac jasmine loves to be sprayed. I pamper my pet with this, not often, sometimes I add fertilizer with microelements to the spraying water, but this is only in summer during flowering.I spend fertilizing watering about once every 2-3 weeks in the summer and do not fertilize the soil at all in winter, since in a cool loggia jasmine falls into a state of dormancy. Only occasionally I water so that the earthy clod does not dry out at all.
Flowering will be profuse if the jasmine is placed in a well-lit place, but not in direct sunlight. I have the sun from 12 to 19 hours (southwest), the loggia is quite deep and the plant stands about one and a half meters from the window on a corner shelf, so it does not get direct rays, but in general it is illuminated quite brightly throughout the day.
Like any busy person, I try to select flowers, of which I have a lot, taking into account their maximum decorativeness and at the same time, so that it is easy to care for them. So, jasmine is quite consistent with this: it is decorative all year round, blooms with delicate fragrant flowers and at the same time does not take much time.
