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The courtyard garden, on the windowsills, balconies and even on cityflower beds with the onset of summer, you can see brightly flowering pelargonium bushes, popularly referred to as geraniums. Thanks to the unpretentiousness and ease of care, pelargonium enjoy the deserved love of florist. But few, unfortunately, suspect that among the family of real “Cinderella” there are their own “queens”.
Royal Pelargonium, Pelargonium grandiflorum or regale differs from its close relatives in its lush flowering and somewhat more whimsical character.
Features of large-flowered pelargonium
As befits a plant with such a big name, at home, royal pelargonium, pictured, is more demanding to care than common varieties of geranium, and it doesn’t bloom for a long time. But, seeing only once huge flowers gathered in inflorescences, umbrellas of various shapes and colors, it is impossible not to get excited by the desire to grow an equally beautiful plant on your window sill.
Royal Pelargonium, reaching a height of 30–60 cm, differs from other varieties:
- folded leaves with a dense, rough to the touch leaf plate and jagged edges;
- large, up to 7 cm in diameter with simple and double flowers.
Ornaments to the inflorescences add multicolor coloring of the petals, but if the zonal geranium has a flowering period ending in the autumn, then the last inflorescences on the royal pelargonium wither away in the second half of summer.
As a result, it is possible to admire the caps of aerial bright colors from 3 to 5 months, and it is doubly sad if the buds do not appear on the bush in the spring.
Why royal pelargonium does not bloom?
After planting a young plant in the ground, amateur flower growers are looking forward to the appearance of spectacular inflorescences above the greens, but sometimes they have to face disappointment. Instead of flowers, large-flowered geranium gives only greens, and fast-growing shoots soon lose their appearance and stretch out. What mistakes were made when caring for royal pelargonium at home, and why, as in the photo, the plant was left almost without flowers?
Indeed, if pelargonium does not bloom within the prescribed time, it can say:
- about the wrong temperature or lack of lighting;
- that a plant has been planted in an overly bulky pot or is receiving inharmonic fertilizer;
- about untimely transplantation;
- about illiterate pruning or its absence.
How to care for royal pelargonium, so that the plant blossoms regularly, is healthy and does not lose its decoration all year round?
Summer care for royal pelargonium at home
Speaking about the unpretentiousness of pelargonium, experts on this type are not evil.
In order for the royal pelargonium to feel comfortable and please the owners with abundant flowering, the florist needs to adhere to just a few rules that will lay down the success of the whole growing.
Large-flowered varieties of pelargonium require lighting and love to be exposed to the brightest sunny windows. Only on the hottest days, the plants need a blackout protecting against burns, but in other cases the light restriction is a risk:
- pulling and exposing the shoots;
- reduce the intensity of flowering;
- dropping buds that have already appeared.
Unlike related species, royal pelargonium does not tolerate drafts and cold wind, if such a plant is planted in a garden, it probably also will not please inflorescences. Therefore, royal pelargoniums are grown at home, and care in the summer includes protection from drafts. Plants feel great and bloom profusely on glazed sun terraces and loggias.
In case of excessive dryness of the air in summer, pelargonium can be sprayed with water at room temperature, making sure that no direct rays of the sun fall on wet leaves and inflorescences.
Flower growers, fascinated by this spectacular crop, need to know that in hot weather, plants are most susceptible to attacks by aphids and other insect pests, which, parasitizing on the stems and leaves, seriously weaken pelargonium. And here the answer to the question: “Why does the royal pelargonium not bloom?” Will be obvious.
Do not forget about watering and fertilizing flowering plants. Although pelargonium easily tolerates dry periods and is not too demanding on the composition of the soil, without water and food, it certainly will not give an adequate number of colors. In the warm season, large-flowered varieties require particularly abundant watering, which is carried out when the top layer of soil dries out a little.
It is possible to prolong the flowering and maintain the strength of the plant, if you remove dried flower gardens that have lost their decorative effect in time.
Features of winter care for large-flowered geraniums
Pelargonium should recover after the wilt of luxurious flowers, but if you leave it until next spring on a warm window-sill, you can not wait for the next flowering. How to care for pelargonium in autumn and winter? With the onset of autumn, when the temperature drops, care for royal pelargonium at home is changing. Plants for three months provide:
- temperature of about 12-15 ° C;
- rare watering, only supporting the reduced activity of pelargonium;
- sufficient lighting.
Feeding is stopped for the entire period of hibernation. If all the conditions of care are met, the plant lays a sufficient number of flower buds and will surely luxuriously bloom with the exit from the winter stupor.
Transplantation and dressing of royal pelargonium
All types of pelargonium are characterized by rapid growth of the aerial part of the plant. If a bush that has grown considerably over the summer, together with the soil extracted from the pot, has completely covered the roots with an earthen clod, at the end of winter royal geraniums are transplanted. The soil for this culture should be loose, well breathable and moisture retaining. Considering why the royal pelargonium does not bloom, the florist must take into account the correct selection of the soil mixture. A good option is a mixture of equal parts of decontaminated garden land, sand and peat.
As the plant's root system does not tolerate stagnant moisture, pelargonium requires a powerful drainage layer, paying less attention to the selection of the pot when planting. It is because of transplanting into too large dishes that many growers are disappointed in the culture, and the royal pelargonium does not bloom.
Getting into a volumetric pot, the plant rapidly increases the green mass, but completely “forgets” about the bud set.
A similar process is underway with the wrong fertilizer mix. If nitrogen predominates in the dressings during the time of bud formation and flowering, the stems and leaves grow and the buds become smaller. The best mixtures for fertilizing pelargonium are distinguished by a high content of potassium and phosphorus, providing abundant and long-term flowering.
Pelargonium pruning
The reason why royal pelargonium does not bloom may be incorrect or insufficient pruning. Since the plants grow rapidly and the buds form on the tips of the shoots, it is easy to enlarge the pure flower buds, in July and August, pinching or cutting the tops of overgrown stems. This measure will allow:
- used cuttings for propagation;
- achieve lush bloom in the upcoming season;
- stimulate the growth of young shoots;
- to give the bush a compact, attractive shape.
Cut the plant better gradually, without seriously injuring the pelargonium, and after the operation the plant must be fed. At the end of winter, with the beginning of a new formation of buds pruning is completed.
Pelargonium
cutting The resulting cuttings can be rooted year-round, but in the warm season it is much easier to make.
Strong tips of shoots with at least two pairs of leaves and cut 5 mm below the node are taken as planting material. It is better to cut the lower leaves immediately and leave no more than 3 upper leaf plates. After this, the cut sections on the cuttings are treated with crushed charcoal and left in the air for 18-24 hours.
True, there is another way. Already 10 minutes after separation from the parent plant, cut cuttings:
- are treated with a root;
- planted in a mixture of sand, humus and peat;
- for 2-3 days cover with non-woven material.
Good results are obtained by planting cuttings in moistened peat tablets.
In any case, planting is watered with phytosporin solution, which will protect the cuts from the development of rot. And how to care for pelargonium after cuttings gave roots?
Until the time when cuttings at a temperature of 19–23 ° C take root well, it will take from 8 to 12 weeks. After this time:
- young plants are planted in a permanent place;
- pinch the main shoot over the third pair of leaves, which will force the bush to give new side stems.
If at home the care of royal pelargonium, as in the photo, is good, the young plants develop well, and already next spring small neat shrubs give the first inflorescences.
