A Detailed Guide to Flower Cultivation Techniques: Open-Ground, Container, and Soilless Growing Methods

China is rich in flower-growing resources, and the flower-growing industry is a representative emerging industry in the country, with its planting area and output value growing year by year. Below is a detailed explanation of the key points of open-ground, container, and soilless flower cultivation techniques, in the hope of providing a reference for everyone.

I. Open-Ground Flower Cultivation Techniques

Open-ground flower cultivation is generally distributed in Yunnan, Guangdong, Shanghai, Beijing, Sichuan, Hebei and other parts of China, and the varieties grown mostly match the local natural climate and geographical characteristics. Specifically, the key points of open-ground flower cultivation techniques mainly include the following aspects:

1. Regular deep soil ploughing and bed making

Making beds for flowers serves to make management easier on the one hand, and on the other hand it is more conducive to the growth and development of the flowers' root systems.

Deep soil ploughing, meanwhile, can make the soil more permeable and can also sterilise and disinfect the soil, preventing the occurrence of pests and diseases.

2. Appropriate thinning of seedlings at the seedling stage

Sometimes it is difficult to sow evenly, resulting in densely distributed flower seedlings. Once this is noticed, the flower seedlings should be thinned and singled early, so that the flower plants can grow thick and healthy.

3. Proper transplanting methods

Generally, open-ground flowers can be transplanted either bare-rooted or with soil, depending on the flower variety. The transplanting time should be chosen for the early morning or evening of a sunny day.

4. Good fertiliser and water management

With open-ground planting, attention must be paid to fertiliser and water management. Usually organic fertiliser should be used as the base fertiliser, and then top-dressing should be carried out according to the growth needs of different flowers. For watering, furrow irrigation or sprinkler irrigation can be chosen; different flowers have different water requirements, so this should be understood in advance at planting time.

II. Container Flower Cultivation Techniques

1. Choosing the potting soil

Generally, herbaceous flowers, woody flowers and succulent flowers have different requirements for soil and cultivation pots. Take succulents, for example: first, the pot size chosen should be small, and the soil should be specially mixed.

2. Pay attention to watering

When it comes to watering, container flowers require more attention than open-ground flowers, because they lack the soil's own moisture regulation and the water must be regulated artificially according to the flowers' needs.

3. Pay attention to pruning

Container flowers place greater emphasis on ornamental value, so more effort must be put into pruning. Pruning work mainly includes pinching out growing tips, removing buds, snapping shoots, bending branches, disbudding, and trimming branches.

III. Soilless Flower Cultivation Techniques

Soilless cultivation of flowers mainly means not using soil as the growing base, but instead maintaining the normal growth of flowers by preparing special growing media and nutrient solutions. The key points of soilless flower cultivation techniques are mainly:

1. Choosing the growing medium

Common growing media for soilless flower cultivation include sand grains, natural gravel, pumice, volcanic rock, vermiculite, perlite, peat, furnace slag, brick pieces, charcoal, asbestos, sawdust, fern roots, bark and so on. A suitable growing medium can be chosen according to the growth habits of the flowers.

2. Preparing the flower nutrient solution

The nutrient solution for soilless cultivation is essentially a mixture of the various nutrient elements needed for flower growth, supplied as nutrients through “watering”.