Not sure what to give for Qixi? Grow carnations together with the one you love

Naodong Handmade

You have 40 friends following this official account!

A bouquet of fresh flowers always wins a girl's heart, but is giving only flowers on an anniversary or holiday a bit too thin?So learning how to care for plants and becoming a plant-care expert is the excuse to get more chances later! This round of holidays, I am going to ride on carnations!

Carnation is also called sweet william (Dianthus caryophyllus). It is a perennial semi-woody herb, usually grown as a biennial. Under greenhouse conditions it blooms all year round, and its capsule is cylindrical.

So how are carnations grown? What good methods are there in cultivation? What should be noted when growing carnations? Please read on with your questions together with the master!

How to grow carnations

Best propagation time:Late January to early February works best, avoiding the hot months of July and August. Autumn also works.

Best growing soil:Carnation is a fibrous-rooted herbaceous flower; its roots like to grow in loose, fertile, well-aerated soil or medium. The best soil for planting carnations is sandy loam.

Growing humidity requirements:Just keep the soil with a certain degree of moisture; do not let it get too dry or too wet.

Best growing temperature:Carnation is a plant that likes cool conditions; the optimum temperature for growth and development is 19-21°C, and the day-night temperature difference should be kept within 10°C.

Best growing light:The longer the accumulated sunshine hours, the more it promotes flower bud differentiation, thus advancing flowering and improving the uniformity of blooming and the cut flower yield.

Notes on growing carnations

Applying fertilizer:Carnation is a shallow-rooted plant, with roots mainly distributed within the 20 cm soil layer. A sufficient amount of base fertilizer should be applied at planting. Use organic fertilizers such as barnyard manure, compost and bone meal as base fertilizer to improve the physical properties of the growing soil and enhance its fertility, making it a loose, fertile loam rich in humus. The base fertilizer must be composted and decomposed before use.

Key watering points:Carnation is a shallow-rooted flower; the planting depth should not exceed 2 cm. After planting, water once thoroughly, and thereafter water thoroughly again when the potting soil becomes dry. Carnation is not tolerant of wetness; apart from increasing watering during the vigorous growth period, flowering period and midsummer, generally do not water too much, just keep the soil with a certain moisture. During the flowering period, avoid the soil being too dry or too wet.

Pruning essentials:Pay special attention not to let any one stem grow too tall, otherwise the nutrients are all spent on growing tall, which is bad for the other flowers. So when overly tall branches and leaves appear, pinch off the top promptly.

Changing potting soil:Soil or medium is the place where plant roots are active. Creating a loose, breathable root-zone environment with a certain capacity to hold fertilizer and water is crucial for carnation cultivation. A soil air gap of about 30% is ideal; heavy, sticky and waterlogged soil is unfavorable for carnation growth and needs to be improved, the core of which is to coordinate the relationship among the solid, liquid and gas phases in the soil.

Propagation essentials:Seed propagation is mainly used for hybrid breeding, or for producing pot flowers from hybrid F1 seeds. The suitable temperature for sowing is 18-20°C, germination in about 1 week, and seedlings in 2-3 months; tissue culture propagation is an important means of producing virus-free seedlings and is widely used in cut flower production. Generally, shoot tips are used for virus-elimination culture, then mass-propagated.

Pest and disease control:Leaf spot: the disease mostly starts from the lower leaves; the spots are round, oval or irregular, 4-5 mm in diameter, reddish-brown and sunken, gradually turning grayish-white. In severe cases the diseased parts produce a black mold layer (conidia), and the leaves turn yellow and droop but do not fall off. When the spots grow on the stem and girdle it, twig blight occurs. When flower buds are infected, round spots appear on the buds with a black mold layer, and spots appear on the pedicels, causing the buds to die. Control methods: spraying 1:1:100 Bordeaux mixture 4-5 times has an obvious effect, and spraying 50% amobam 1000x solution also has a certain effect; apply more phosphorus and potassium fertilizer to enhance disease resistance.

Hydroponic carnations

1. Remove the leaves at the depth to be inserted into water, cut the base diagonally and insert into water, keeping good ventilation between the flower stems.

2. For water-grown carnations, never spray water on the flowers, to avoid rot.

3. It is sensitive to "ethylene", so keep it away from overripe fruits and vegetables, smoke, incense, etc. Adding an anti-ethylene preservative to the water is even better.

4. To make them open earlier, cut the flower stems back heavily and insert them into warm water preservative solution.

Soil-grown carnations

For planting soil, rice-root mud is best. In December, dig the ground deep to 20-30 cm; turn it once more in late January to early February, and apply base fertilizer; only one kind may be applied. Apply 100 jin of cake fertilizer or bone meal per mu, or an appropriate amount of superphosphate. In March, make the beds: bed surface width 1 m, ditch width 60 cm, ditch depth 35 cm, to facilitate drainage.

Generally, seedlings inserted in January are planted out at the end of April, and seedlings inserted in February are planted out in early May. 4-5 days before planting, control the moisture in the seedbed; water once the day before, and on the second day dig up the seedlings with soil. The planting distance is about four rows per bed, with a plant spacing of about 18 cm. Do not plant too deep, and water thoroughly after planting.

Experience in growing carnations

1. Generally move them into the greenhouse around "Frost's Descent", with the temperature regulated to 10-20°C, which is most suitable. To force or delay the flowering period, the temperature can be adjusted appropriately higher or lower. Try to reduce the humidity in the greenhouse to reduce the occurrence of diseases.

2. During the seedling stage, pinch the tips 1-2 times to promote branching, so that each plant has about 10 side branches. After pinching, the plant shape is beautiful and flowering is abundant. As the branches grow, supports should also be set up to prevent lodging. During the growth period, promptly remove the side buds and small flower buds produced on each branch, keeping only one flower bud at the top of each branch, so that nutrients are concentrated to supply the top bud.

All the excitement is at Huayipai Youzan Mall

With flowers, with love | Huayipai