Barberry (shrub): planting and care in the open field, reproduction and cultivation

How to grow a barberry shrub, plant and give proper care, many gardeners want to know. The plant is unpretentious: it is easy to cultivate. But you need to get a neat and beautiful bush. Many gardeners grow a crop for the sake of sour fruits. They contain vitamins, antioxidants, so they are very useful. Berries are used to make excellent marmalade and vitamin compotes.

Is it possible to grow a barberry in the garden

Barberry is grown by almost all gardeners. In the old dacha you can find a sprawling bush of barberry. It has green leaves and bright fruits collected in a brush.An ordinary barberry planted in a row forms an impenetrable hedge. At the modern summer cottage, ornamental varieties are grown. They have colorfully colored leaves that decorate the territory. Dwarf species are planted on an alpine hill.

Main conditions for successful plant cultivation:

a well-lit place;
soils with a neutral or slightly alkaline reaction;
moderate soil moisture.

The plant quickly adapts to the habitat conditions in the garden and begins to bear fruit.

Which regions are suitable for cultivation

Under natural conditions, barberry is found in the Caucasus and Primorye. There it forms impenetrable thickets in open ground. The plant has perfectly adapted to life in the gardens of the middle lane.

Adult bushes hibernate without shelter, although young ones require preparation for the cold season.

In the Urals, summers are short and hot, and winters are long and cold. Barberry successfully hibernates only under a well-made shelter. Without it, the ground and underground parts of the bush freeze slightly. In Siberia, in addition to the main shelter, it is required to throw snow on the bush. In the spring, the snowdrift is raked, the shelter is removed. Barberry is starting to grow.

How to choose and prepare seedlings for planting

Preference should be given to 2-year-old seedlings: they take root faster. Plants should have 2-3 well-developed shoots. When buying plants with a closed root system, you should turn the container upside down and inspect the drainage holes. White or light yellow roots should peep through them. This means that the plant has a developed underground part and will soon take root in the garden.

When purchasing a barberry with an open root system, you need to choose a bush with 1-2 strong roots and a developed fibrous part.

Required soil composition

Before you plant a bush, you should remember what kind of soil the barberry loves. It grows and thrives in light soils and prefers soil that is neutral to slightly alkaline.

Under natural conditions, the shrub settles on the slopes of mountains or in the foothills. There, the soils are not rich in humus, they have an alkaline reaction, which gives an admixture of crushed stone. Therefore, in the garden, he needs soil, as well as in his habitat. Clay soils are recommended to be sanded (to create a lighter environment), acidity must be reduced by adding lime.

In addition, small gravel should be added to the planting pit.

Choosing a seat

Before planting, you need to decide what kind of barberry will grow in the garden. It depends on where the shrub will be planted. Ornamental varieties feel great in partial shade, but fruit-bearing varieties require a well-lit place.Barberry is a spreading plant, so it should be planted away from other crops. The distance should be at least 2.5-3 m.

Date and disembarkation scheme

Gardeners are interested in: when to plant shrubs. The ideal time for planting is early spring, as soon as the snow melts. The barberry will have enough time to adapt to the new place and build up the root system for the winter. Sometimes it is permissible to plant a bush in the fall, but in this case, the planting time should be calculated in such a way that the plant has time to take root before the onset of stable frosts. This will take 3-4 weeks.

But if the purchased plant has a closed root system, it can be planted in the summer. The bush is carefully removed from the planter, the roots are straightened, the dried ones are cut out, and placed in the planting hole.

A barberry with an open root system purchased in August can wait for spring in the dig.For this, a ditch is torn off, the excavated soil is piled on the south side of the ditch. The bush is placed obliquely (top on a mound) and added dropwise. At the top of the hill, a part of the shoots with 2-3 buds is left. With the onset of frost, the trench is covered with white lutrasil and covered with snow.

Favorable neighborhood

Barberry grows intensively, but does not capture the neighboring territory. The exception is old varieties: they give an abundance of root shoots. In one place, the shrub lives up to 50 years; an adult plant does not tolerate transplantation. But during flowering, pollinating insects flock to it: and this should be used.

Experienced gardeners place strawberry beds next to it: bees pollinate the flowers, and the yield increases. It is important to plant nearby plants that bloom at the same time as the barberry.

How to care for a tree in the area

In order to get a beautiful and regularly fruiting plant, he needs to create conditions that are close to real. The beginning of fruiting depends on how correctly the barberry is planted.

The rules for growing shrubs are simple: you need to feed the bush in time, water and prune.

Irrigation

Barberry does not tolerate excessive moisture. It needs to be watered only in severe drought. In a typical summer, he provides himself with water. Monitoring the humidity of the near-stem circle is required for young plants that were planted last spring.

In order to retain moisture in the soil, the trunk circle should be mulched with dried plant residues or chopped wood chips. To prevent the outflow of nitrogen from the soil, it is recommended to shed the wood chips with a solution of urea.

Weeding and loosening the soil

Young barberries require regular weeding: plants are photophilous, and rapidly developing weeds oppress them.Weeding is recommended to be combined with loosening. In this case, you should be especially careful not to damage the roots. Mature plants feel great on sod near-stem circles. With this method of cultivation, the grass should be mowed regularly.

Fertilizer and regular watering

In nature, the plant does well without fertilizer. But cultivars need feeding. But it is important to remember: the plant does not tolerate excess nutrition. When planting, the planting pit is filled with complex fertilizer. Therefore, it is not required to feed the barberry for the next 3 years.

Starting from the 4th year, decorative varieties require nitrogen in the spring. Pour them with a solution of urea (30 g per 10 liters of water). Fruit bushes require the introduction of potassium and phosphorus. The first feeding is carried out in May-June, the second - in the fall, before preparing the plant for winter.

Frequently feed shrubs should not be: excess nutrition causes oppression of the plant and provokes diseases.

Crown formation

Barberry is an ideal plant for the garden. Without formation, it turns into a sprawling ball, but tangled branches are very rare: shoots grow almost vertically. The gardener is only required to cut out damaged and dried branches in a timely manner, as well as those that interfere with bush care activities.

Decorative varieties can be formed in the form of any shape: pyramid, cube, cone. Beginning gardeners will need a topiary frame or template for this. The fence is usually formed in the form of a rectangular parallelepiped. After pruning, the plant should be fed: give decorative varieties foliar top dressing on the leaves. A fermented herb infusion will do.

After sanitary pruning in autumn, the plant is fed with phosphorus-potassium fertilizers. But it is important to remember: the barberry recovers quickly, so pruning should be done regularly.

Preparing the bush for wintering

In regions where winter temperatures are rarely negative, the barberry hibernates without shelter. It is enough to carry out sanitary pruning and add a mineral complex.

But in other areas the plant requires additional preparation for winter:

cut out unripe shoots (they are light green);
shorten the rest by 2/3;
tie the crown with twine or wire;
top with white lutrasil or spanbond;
cover the root zone with spruce branches with a layer of 15-20 cm (it will also protect against rodents).

Prophylactic treatment of shrubs

Barberry is damaged by aphids, moths and sawflies. To prevent the attack of pests in the spring, it is recommended to carry out preventive treatment of the shrub. Spraying with a solution of "Karbofos", copper-containing preparations is suitable.

Features of flowering and fruiting

Blossoming barberry is an excellent honey plant. It attracts pollinating insects to the garden. Flowering is long: up to 3 weeks.

What year does it begin to bear fruit

Berry barberries, when planted with 2-year-old seedlings, begin to bear fruit in the 3rd year of life in the garden. When forcing plants from seeds - for the 5-6th year. The bush yields annually.

The period of flowering and harvest ripening

Blossoming begins in May, but there is no clear deadline: it depends on average daily temperatures. Shrub blooms for 2-3 weeks. It also smells good.

Collection and use of berries

Red barberry ripens at the end of July. The fruits do not crumble, keep on the branches until cold weather. But their taste deteriorates: for use in food and preparation of blanks, it is required to pick the fruits before the beginning of September.

How to propagate barberry

Gardeners know different ways to propagate barberry:

Old varieties of barberry reproduce by abundant root shoots. It is dug up and planted in the spring in permanent places.
Hybrids and rootstock plants should be propagated exclusively by cuttings or grafting into the crown of another barberry: other methods will not convey the quality of the mother plant.
Varieties are effectively (though long) propagated by seeds. In this case, the need for stratification of the material should be taken into account. It is required either to sow before winter, or to withstand 60 days in the refrigerator in a damp cloth.
A method that does not require labor from the gardener is propagation by layering. In early spring, the branch is pinned to the ground, sprinkled with soil, and the top is cut off. The next spring, the finished plant with a clod of earth is planted in a permanent place.
Delenka - a method used when there is a desire to transplant an adult bush. In the spring, the plant is carefully removed from the ground, the excess soil is shaken off, and the damaged roots are cut off. Then they are divided into the required number of parts, weak shoots are cut out from the aerial part, strong ones are cut to stumps with 3-4 buds. Delenki are immediately planted in a permanent place and shaded from the sun.

It is important to remember: seed and planting material should be taken only from he althy plants.

The use of shrubs in landscape design

The main value of the barberry is a quick recovery after pruning and decoration throughout the year: from early spring to winter. Against the backdrop of snow cover, scarlet clusters of berries look attractive. It is the decorativeness of the shrub that makes it attractive for landscape design.

Breeders offer various ornamental varieties and hybrids of barberry. They are small in size and have unexpected foliage color. But the fruits are distinguished by a specific bitter taste: they are not eaten. Such graceful bushes adorn rock gardens, paths.

Krupnomery gardeners use to create living impenetrable hedges. In this case, they are planted in a checkerboard pattern at a distance of 50-100 cm from each other. Common barberry can be used as a tapeworm plant. It is given its original shape by pruning and admired throughout the year.

What problems beginner gardeners face

Barberry is an unpretentious plant, and novice gardeners have nothing to fear: they can easily cope with caring for it. But it is recommended to provide for the possibility of making some mistakes:

Planting in a lowland or in an area flooded in the spring. Barberry does not tolerate getting wet roots.
Placement on acidic soils. The shrub stops growing.
Excess nitrogen in the soil. This error leads to fungal disease.
Planting too often. Plants are inconvenient to care for.
Frequent and abundant watering. The roots rot, the plant dies.
Neglecting regular pruning. In fruit barberries, it leads to a decrease in yield, in ornamental ones, to a loss of foliage color.
Placing in the shade. The plant will be depressed: it loves sunlight.
Planting too close to other cultivated plants. The barberry is actively growing, and its shoots will interfere with caring for the neighbors.
Attempt to transplant an adult bush. Most likely he will die. It is recommended to use a layer or cutting for planting in a new place.
Planting a seedling with an open root system at the wrong time.

For the successful cultivation of shrubs, you should carefully study all the rules and follow them.