How do you grow gardenias so they thrive best?

Gardenias stay evergreen all year round and bloom around the Dragon Boat Festival every year. Their flowers are pure white, densely layered and richly fragrant, making them an excellent plant for urban landscaping, highway greening and courtyard bonsai display. That is why gardenias have always been so popular, but many people do not know how to care for them after buying them. Follow the editor below to see how to grow gardenias!

The growing environment for gardenias

Gardenias prefer a warm, humid, sunny and well-ventilated environment, but dislike intense direct sun. They do well in light shade, tolerate partial shade, fear waterlogging and are fairly cold-hardy, though in Northeast China, North China and Northwest China they can only be grown as potted greenhouse flowers.

Propagation methods for gardenias

Gardenias can be propagated by many methods, both sexual and asexual. Cuttings and layering are generally used, and division and seed sowing can also be used but are rarely adopted. In the north, potted plants generally do not easily set seed.

1. Sexual propagation

Generally, plump, dark red ripe fruits are chosen, dried in the shell in the sun or in the shade to be used as seed. Before sowing, cut open the seed coat with scissors, dig out the seeds, rub them apart in hot water, remove floating seeds or impurities, then scoop out the sunken, plump seeds, spread them on a bamboo mat and place them in a ventilated spot to dry off excess moisture. Generally, a sunny hillside or a sandy loam plot with deep, loose, fertile soil is chosen for sowing. Land at the edges of fields or corners can be used, or it can be intercropped or relay-cropped with legumes. Before planting, plow the land 1-1.5 chi deep, remove stumps of miscellaneous trees, and make beds with a bed surface width of 4-5 chi (the spacing can be larger if the soil is good, otherwise smaller), with a bed height of 6 cun. Farmyard manure, green manure or human and livestock manure water can be applied as base fertilizer, for example 20-30 dan of human excrement and urine per mu. After the soil dries, shallow-rake the clods and level the bed surface. On the bed surface, open sowing furrows at a row spacing of 6-7 cun, about 1 cun deep, ready for sowing.

Gardenias can be sown in spring or autumn, generally mostly in spring. Spring sowing is done around Yushui, and autumn sowing around Qiufen. When sowing, mix the seeds with wood ash and sow them evenly in the sowing furrows, then cover and level the furrows with fine soil or burnt soil, cover with grass and sprinkle water, keeping the soil moist often to help seedlings emerge. Use 4-6 jin of seed per mu. After seedlings emerge, remove the covering grass promptly, and during the seedling stage weed frequently, being careful not to damage the seedling roots. After weeding, topdress with dilute human excrement and urine water each time. After one year of raising seedlings, they can be transplanted. If transport is over a long distance, it is best to coat the roots with yellow mud slurry, cover with grass to retain moisture, plant one plant per hole, then cover with soil, press firm and sprinkle water. After planting, cultivate and weed and topdress once each in spring and summer every year. Human and livestock manure, stable manure, compost, cake fertilizer and the like can all be applied. Before flowering in summer, it is better to apply fertilizer with a higher phosphorus and potassium content. Fertilization is generally done after weeding and loosening the soil.

2. Asexual propagation

① Cuttings: can be divided into spring cuttings and autumn cuttings. Spring cuttings are done in mid-to-late February; autumn cuttings from late September to late October. There are slight differences between the north and the south, but the survival rate is highest between summer and autumn. Select healthy 2-3 year old branches for cuttings, cut 10-12 cm lengths, remove the lower leaves, keep the top two leaves and cut each in half, first dip in vitamin B12 injection, then insert obliquely into the cutting bed, leaving only one node above. Be careful to shade and maintain a certain humidity.

Generally they can root in 1 month. Under 80% relative humidity and a temperature of 20-24°C, it takes about 15 days. If soaked in 20×10^-6 to 50×10^-6 indolebutyric acid for 24 hours, the effect is even better. When the rooted seedlings begin to grow, transplant them or pot them individually. They can bloom after 2 years. In the south, water propagation is also used, that is, inserting the cuttings into a round disc woven from reed stems, letting it float on the water surface so that the lower part roots in the water, and then transplanting for cultivation.

② Layering: generally done around Qingming in April or during the plum rain season. In April, select 1-year-old vigorous branches 25-30 cm long from 3-year-old mother plants for layering, pull them to the ground, and wound the part of the branch that enters the soil. If the wounded part can be dipped in 200 ppm powdered naphthalene acetic acid and then covered with soil and pressed firm, rooting is even easier. If there is a three-forked branch, then at the fork opening three seedlings can be obtained at one time. Generally, rooting occurs after 20-30 days. After rooting in June, they can be separated from the mother plant, and by the next spring they can be planted separately with soil or potted individually. For transplanting seedlings or potting, spring is best, carried out during the plum rain season, and a soil ball is needed. During the growing period, keep the soil moist, and water more during the flowering period and midsummer. Fertilize once a month, and apply phosphorus and potassium fertilizer once more before flowering. In early spring of the following year, prune and shape, and promptly cut off dead branches and leggy shoots.

Now that we have looked at the growing environment and propagation methods of gardenias, let us take a look together at how gardenias should actually be grown!