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Juniperum ordinary - the most common, typical, but by no means the most usual kind of a generic family. It is difficult to imagine a group of plants whose representatives could look like 10-meter trees, large shrubs with a pyramidal or drooping crown, as well as very low, creeping specimens of stannica form.
Ordinary juniper can be found on the territory of Europe and North Africa, in Asia and the North American continent. Plants prefer a temperate climate, extremely unpretentious and live in the most unassuming conditions for several hundred years. The vitality and adaptability to external conditions helped the juniper to survive many climatic disasters and survive to this day.
Description of juniper (Juniperus communis)
Due to natural selection, many different forms of juniper appeared. Plants that make up the lower tier of light deciduous and coniferous forests, growing in the mountainous terrain and on the coast, were cultivated as far back as the 16th century. Over the past time, botanists not only compiled a comprehensive description of the common juniper, but also brought out new varieties.
Differing in size and appearance of the crown, plants from different parts of the world gave rise to stable forms. By type of branching and the type of shoots, plants are most often isolated:
- with a wide squat crown and dangling shoots f. Pendula;
- with a wide columnar crown and several drooping shoots f. Suecica;
- with a narrow low crown in the form of a column f. Compressa;
- with a compact spreading spreading in the breadth of the crown f. Depressa;
- with a narrow vertical crown and upward branches f. Hibernica;
- with a wide crochet f. S.
There are other species, named after the discoverers or the place of detection.
Like the shape, the color of the juniper crown is diverse. In a typical plant of this species, the prickly lanceolate needles on the obverse have a noticeable groove, a glossy surface and a characteristic light strip. The basic coloring of the needles about one and a half centimeters long is saturated green with a gray tinge. Today, gardeners and landscape designers have a variety of juniper with a practical blue (Blue) or golden (Aurea) needles of young shoots.
The branches of this species of juniper are covered with a reddish bark, which becomes brown with age and begins to flake off the wood. Approximately at the age of ten, plants acquire the possibility of seed reproduction. After pollination on female specimens, round, dense pine cones are formed, concealing three seeds and ripening in the second year after appearance.
Forms and varieties of juniper
Wild-growing varieties of juniper have become fertile ground for the work of breeders.
On the basis of the common juniper, many varieties have been obtained, which are usually classified according to the size of the plant and the rate of its growth:
- Juniper trees, each year adding 30 cm, are considered full-grown.
- Medium-sized plants grow 15 or slightly more centimeters per season.
- The annual growth of dwarf junipers is 8-15 cm.
- Juniper, belonging to miniature varieties, increase their size no more than 8 cm.
- The lowest growth rates for plants from the group micro, for a year growing up by 1-3 cm.
Varieties of common juniper with drooping branches often do not fit into any group, and their growth goes in different directions. So nature creates unique, weeping plants.
Common Juniper Horstmann (Horstmann)
An example of such a bizarre, asymmetrical form is the juniper found in the swamps of Germany. The plant with an average growth rate several years after planting reaches a height of, meters. Although at the beginning of growth shoots are directed upwards, lengthening, they droop, forming the original crown of the juniper of the ordinary Horstmann. This light-loving and unpretentious plant has green prickly needles, coarsening on adult branches.
In landscape design juniper of this variety is always the center of the composition, attracting looks and making the imagination of nature surprising.
Common juniper Repanda (Repanda)
One of the most common forms of juniper is a shrub with a flat, round or trailing crown. The height of the juniper of the ordinary Rapand does not exceed 30 cm, but the breadth of the branch grows to a diameter of one and a half meters.
Variety from Ireland, without signs of defeat, withstands forty-degree frosts, but in a continental climate bushes can suffer from excessive air dryness. According to the description, the common juniper of this variety possesses curved needles with a length of slightly less than a centimeter. The crown is green with a silvery tint, formed by light strips on needles.
Common Juniper Green Carpet
In form to the variety of the Rapand, the common juniper Green Carpet is very close. Its name is very eloquent. Indeed, the bush growing horizontally forms a green carpet with a height of only 10-15 cm. Due to the short stature, the plant is not afraid of cold winters, does not suffer from wind and can withstand frosts down to -40 ° C.
Juniperus Common Hibernica (Hibernica)
Another Irish variety of juniper has the form of a narrow pyramid or column. The plant has been in culture for about 200 years. The shrub is appreciated thanks to the bright, not fading winter needles and dense crown, formed by growing shoots. Adult juniper reaches a height of 4 to 8 meters, throughout the year decorating the garden with green-blue spiky needles.
In Russian conditions, the common juniper of Hibernica does not always experience the winter. The frost resistance limit of the plant is -17 ° C.
Common Juniper Arnold (Arnold)
The height of an adult shrub of this variety does not exceed one or two meters. The plants of the juniper of the ordinary Arnold are distinguished by a narrow shape resembling a column or a pyramid, which is only 10 m per year, as well as barbed short needles of a greenish-gray or silver-blue hue.
Common Juniper Mayer (Mayer)
In the middle of the last century, the German breeder Erich Mayer obtained a variety of juniper with a wide, pyramid-like crown. The photophilous and frost-resistant shrub grows to a height of three meters and is named after the creator.
In landscape designers and fans of coniferous plants, the juniper of Meyer's ordinary is valued thanks to the decorative crown and the silvery-green needles covering it. Thorny needles with a glossy surface resemble spruce needles, making juniper like a popular ephedra.
Common Juniper Suezica (Suecica)
Common juniper Suezika common in the northern part of Europe and Russia does not preserve a single pyramidal shape. The bush forms several trunks at once, as they grow to a height of 10 meters. The quaint crown consists of a set of straight-growing branches that droop at the ends. The variety with a small annual increase, high winter hardiness and excellent decorative qualities can easily find a place in the design of dachas, parks and city squares.
Planting and care of juniper common
Juniper is an ordinary light-loving evergreen plant, thanks to its unpretentious nature, it settles under penumbra. On a summer residence the plant is selected a sunny, sheltered from the wind place with a light, moderately nutritious soil.
In the ground, the shrub is transported in spring, in April or May, or in the autumn, before the arrival of frost. To simplify the care of the juniper common after planting, the pit is prepared in advance.
- The bottom of the pit, somewhat larger than the root system of the bush, is lined with a drainage layer of brick crumb, sand or expanded clay.
- Then prepare a mixture on the basis of turf ground, sand and peat with the addition of clay.
- As an additional feed, nitrogen-phosphorus fertilizers are added to the soil.
- If the soil is acidic, dolomite flour is added to it.
- Landing is carried out in 10 to 15 days, when the soil settles.
- Seedling in the pit is placed so that the root neck is a few centimeters above the soil or level with it.
- After filling the pit, the soil is compacted and watered, and then the circle is abundantly mulched.
Description of the juniper of the ordinary includes the mention of the unpretentiousness of the plant. This is so, therefore, caring for the bush is not difficult. In a hot time, the planting is watered. Support the tone and ornamentality of the needles will help its irrigation.
The treatment of the ground under the juniper is a shallow loosening, weeding and spring top dressing with the help of complex mixtures for ornamental conifers. If the plant is planted on stony or sandy soil, fertilizers are introduced more often.
If planted on the site of plants to become a hedgerow, a regular, but accurate haircut of the juniper is performed. It is carried out in the spring or early summer so that the growth that has appeared in the winter is stronger.
Juniper trees do not grow so quickly, so wrong pruning will long remind themselves. Falling and creeping plants do not shear.
In the autumn, sanitary trimming of a common juniper is carried out, the soil is cleaned of plant residues, the bushes and the soil under it are sprayed with a Bordeaux liquid or other fungicide. Adult plants, adapted for wintering in a particular region, do not cover for the winter. Crowns of young junipers are fixed with twine, covered with lapnik and sprinkled with snow.
