How to grow crown vetch? Detailed growing methods and precautions
1. Site selection. Crown vetch (Coronilla varia) has low requirements for soil and is highly adaptable, but it is very afraid of waterlogging, so when choosing a site we also need to pay a little attention to the drainage and permeability of the soil and terrain. 2. Seedling sprouting. Crown vetch seeds are small and can be sown in spring, summer and autumn
1. Site selection
Crown vetch has low requirements for soil and is highly adaptable, but it is very afraid of waterlogging, so when choosing a site we also need to pay a little attention to the drainage and permeability of the soil and terrain.
2. Seedling sprouting
Crown vetch seeds are small and can be sown in spring, summer and autumn. Before sowing we should carefully prepare the ground. Secondly, crown vetch has a high rate of non-viable seeds, so we need to carry out sprouting; it is best to soak the seeds in warm water at 80°, and after it cools naturally, sow about 14 to 15 hours later, and the survival rate will be much higher.
2. Fertilizing
Crown vetch grows slowly at the seedling stage. To prevent water and soil loss from the sowing soil and to support the healthy growth of crown vetch, we can choose to mix-sow it with grass species of the Poaceae family. After a growth cycle, crown vetch can absorb all the companion grass on the ground surface; the presence of the companion grass can be said to be equivalent to fertilizer for crown vetch.
Now that you understand how to grow crown vetch, next the editor will introduce to you what the most suitable growing conditions for crown vetch are!
Crown vetch Coronilla varia L. Crown vetch illustrated guide: how to grow crown vetch / how to propagate crown vetch
Crown vetch profileCrown vetch Coronilla varia L.
Crown vetch growing methods and precautions, an introduction to crown vetch
Crown vetch is a perennial herbaceous legume, with many branches, creeping growth, creeping stems more than 1 m long, and natural clumps 20-50 cm tall. The root system is thick and strong, with well-developed lateral roots, adventitious buds and root nodules on the roots. The leaves are odd-pinnate compound leaves, with alternate leaflets, 11-27 in number, oblong or obovate. Because the inflorescence resembles a crown and the flower color changes (that is, from pink to purple-red in the later stage), it is also known by the alias variable crown vetch. The pod is slender and finger-like, 3-12 segments totaling 2-3 cm long, the segments break easily, and each segment contains 1 seed; the seeds are slender, kidney-shaped and dark brown.
Crown vetch likes light and does not tolerate shade, and has few pests and diseases. It grows vigorously and is highly adaptable. It is native to Europe and southwestern Asia. It has more than twenty years of application history in China and more than seventy years of application history in the United States.
Morphological characteristics of crown vetch
Crown vetch is a perennial herb, with a thick and well-developed root system densely bearing root nodules; the adventitious buds on its roots have strong regeneration ability, enabling the root system to spread horizontally.
The stem is hollow, angular, soft in texture, creeping and extending upward, up to 180 cm at most, with strong branching ability; the leaf buds on the nodes easily sprout to form many lateral branches. Odd-pinnate compound leaves, alternate.
The umbel inflorescence is axillary, with numerous flowers, pink or pale red, creeping growth, creeping stems more than 1 m long, and natural clumps 25-50 cm tall. The root system is thick and strong, the lateral roots are well developed, and there are adventitious buds and root nodules on the roots.
The leaves of crown vetch are odd-pinnate compound leaves, with alternate leaflets, 11-27 in number, oblong or obovate. The pod is slender and finger-like, 3-12 segments totaling 2-3 cm long, the segments break easily, and each segment contains 1 seed. *The seeds are slender, kidney-shaped and dark brown.
The root system is thick and strong and well developed, densely bearing root nodules; the adventitious buds on its roots have strong regeneration ability, which can make the root system spread horizontally. The stem is hollow, angular, soft in texture, creeping and extending upward, up to 180 cm at most, with extremely strong branching ability; the leaf buds on the nodes easily sprout to form many lateral branches. Odd-pinnate compound leaves, alternate. The umbel inflorescence is axillary, with numerous flowers, pink or pale red.
The root system is well developed; the main root reaches 80 cm deep into the soil after one year, with strong horizontal spreading ability, and the lateral roots run horizontally more than 1 m, with adventitious buds growing on the roots that can form new plants and underground stems. The flowering period is from May to July, with axillary umbel inflorescences, mostly with 14 small flowers arranged in a ring at the tip of the peduncle in a crown shape; the flower color changes from pink in the early stage to purple-red in the later stage, hence the name variable crown vetch. The fruit ripening period is from August to September, with pods, slender and finger-like, with obvious pod segments, 2-3 cm long, with 3-12 segments in total, the segments break easily, and each segment contains 1 seed.
The seeds are small and hard, slender and kidney-shaped, reddish-brown. The thousand-grain weight is 4.1 g, and there are about 240,000 seeds per kilogram.
Ecological habits of crown vetch
Crown vetch likes a warm and humid climate, but because its root-tiller buds lie dormant about 20 cm below the ground surface, it has strong cold resistance and overwintering ability. In Xi'an the green period is about 220 days, and in Wuhan and Qianjiang it is about more than 300 days, remaining basically evergreen.
This grass needs a lot of water for growth, but because its root system is well developed, on a road slope in Shaanxi it can reach 1.4 m in one year and actually reach 4.8 m deep in two years. There can be more than a hundred lateral roots per square meter, and it is also relatively drought-tolerant; generally in places with annual precipitation of 400-450 mm it can grow normally even without irrigation conditions. It is not waterlogging-tolerant; after being submerged for several days the roots rot and the whole plant dies.
Crown vetch has low requirements for soil and can grow in soil with a pH of 5.0-8.2. It grows vigorously and is highly adaptable. It is native to Europe and southwestern Asia. It has more than twenty years of application history in China and also more than seventy years of application history in the United States.
Crown vetch has a well-developed root system and is used for highway slope protection in the northwest region; it can reach 1.4 m in one year of growth and more than 4.8 m in two years. There can be more than a hundred lateral roots per square meter, and its drought resistance is good; generally in places with annual precipitation of 400-450 mm it can grow normally even without irrigation conditions. It likes sufficient light and is not very waterlogging-tolerant; long-term water accumulation may cause the plant to die. It has low requirements for soil and can grow in soil with a pH of 5.0-8.2. Pests and diseases occur very rarely.
Precautions for crown vetch cultivation techniques
Crown vetch grows slowly at the seedling stage. If the issue of slope scouring is temporarily not considered, with strengthened management and care it can reach a coverage rate of more than 80% within six months. In order to help prevent water and soil loss as quickly as possible, according to different construction times and site conditions, mixing and sowing with grass species of the Poaceae family can cover more than 80% of the ground surface within 40 days, while crown vetch needs about two years to completely "eat up" the companion grass species and cover the ground surface. Once crown vetch covers the ground surface, it will remain green like a carpet for a long time with bright flower colors. Crown vetch has more than ten years of history on highways in Shaanxi Province and has been promoted to Hunan, Hubei, Henan, Hebei, Shanxi and other places. It has sixty or seventy years of use history on highways in the United States, with good feedback from all sides.
Propagation methods of crown vetch
Crown vetch is commonly propagated by seed, and broadcast sowing, drill sowing and hole sowing are all acceptable.
The seeding rate per mu is 0.5-1 KG, and it can be sown in spring, summer and autumn. Crown vetch seeds are small and are sown shallowly, so the ground should be carefully prepared before sowing. The hard seed rate is as high as 70-80%, so seed treatment must be carried out before sowing. For a small amount of seed, it can be soaked in 15% sulfuric acid for 20-30 minutes before sowing, or soaked in warm water at 70-80°C, allowed to cool naturally, and soaked for about 12-15 hours before sowing. For large amounts of seed, the seed coat is generally broken with a rice milling machine before sowing. The germination rate is generally 40-90%, and some hard seeds will not sprout until the second year. It grows slowly at the seedling stage, so weeds must be removed in time; once establishment succeeds, it can suppress weed growth.
Disease and pest control of crown vetch
Crown vetch likes light and does not tolerate shade, and pests and diseases occur very rarely. Crown vetch has few pests and diseases, has no alternate-host damage phenomenon with fruit trees such as citrus and peach, and can provide habitat for natural enemies.
This grass likes light and does not tolerate shade, and has few pests and diseases. It grows vigorously and is highly adaptable, cold-tolerant, drought-tolerant and tolerant of barren soil; it has low requirements for soil and can grow in soil with a pH of 5.0-8.2. Pay attention to drainage during the rainy season. Management is simple and it is extremely easy to cultivate.
Variety classification of crown vetch
Coronilla genus, Fabaceae (papilionaceous family), 55 species, distributed in the Mediterranean region of Europe and western Asia. In China, 3 species including crown vetch C. buxifolia Hance have been introduced and cultivated. Herbs or shrubs; odd-pinnate compound leaves, leaflets entire; stipules small and membranous, or large and leaf-like; flowers drooping, arranged in a stalked umbel; calyx shortly bell-shaped, with 5 teeth, nearly equal; corolla yellow, rarely purple, petals long-stalked; stamens 10, diadelphous (9+1), anthers uniform; ovary sessile, ovules numerous; pod slender, cylindrical, four-angled or slightly flattened, splitting into one-seeded, oblong pod segments; seeds transversely oblong.
New variety
In 1984, Northwest A&F University irradiated the root buds of West German crown vetch with 60CO gamma rays, from which the new variety Xifu crown vetch was selected and bred.
The main characteristics of this variety:
(1) Vigorous growth and high grass yield; fresh grass yield per mu is 1593.4 kg, an increase of 17% over the control West German crown vetch;
(2) Well-developed root system, with the thickest diameter reaching 2.5 cm and horizontal distribution of 3.0 m;
(3) Low toxicity; at full bloom the beta-nitropropionic acid content of hay is 30.3-31.7 mg/g, 49.5%-51.9% lower than the control;
(4) Both drought resistance and cold resistance are strong; it still grows vigorously in Haiyuan County, Ningxia, where annual rainfall is 300 mm. In Pengyang County, Ningxia, where the lowest temperature reaches -28°C, it can still overwinter safely. It is tolerant of barren soil and saline-alkali soil, but does not adapt to acidic soil and has poor moisture tolerance. It passed the review of the National Forage Variety Approval Committee in November 1991.
Market prospects
This variety can already be promoted on a large scale in China's Loess Plateau, Northeast, East China, Southwest, South China and other regions.
Distribution range of crown vetch
Crown vetch is native to Europe, southwestern Asia, and the southern Europe and eastern Mediterranean area. It has more than twenty years of application history in China and more than seventy years of application history in the United States.
Crown vetch has now been widely introduced and planted in North China, East China, Central China, Northwest China and other places. Crown vetch likes light, and its suitable growth temperature is 15°C to 30°C, but its cold resistance is extremely strong; it can still overwinter safely at a low temperature of minus 34, and if there is snow cover it can also overwinter in Harbin in the Northeast. It has low requirements for soil and is tolerant of barren soil, and management is extensive; it can grow well in soil with a pH of 5.0-8.2, and among these it grows best in well-drained, neutral and fertile soil. Crown vetch is drought-tolerant but not waterlogging-tolerant; it grows well in semi-arid areas with annual precipitation of 400-600 mm, but if water accumulates for 3-4 days, the roots rot and the plant dies.
Crown vetch is a newly introduced ground-cover forage and flower from abroad, with numerous flowers, graceful flower form, bright flower color, a long flowering period, dense stems and leaves, a large grass-layer coverage, and a long green period. In Xi'an the green period is about 220 days, and in Wuhan it is about more than 300 days.
Crown vetch is suitable for planting in parts of Northwest China, North China, Northeast China and the south of China. It has been planted in Beijing, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Nanjing and other places, and grows well.
Distribution quantity worldwide: 55 species; China: 3 species.
Uses and purposes of crown vetch: ornamental value
Crown vetch is very beautiful in appearance, especially when flowering, when the flower color ranges from light red to purple-red.
Crown vetch spreads quickly, has large coverage, strong stress resistance, and a long flowering period (full bloom from May to June; after full bloom, sporadic flowering in Qianjiang can be extended to November), and is basically evergreen. It is both a grass and a flower and basically evergreen, with relatively high ornamental and practical value.
Application value
Crown vetch can be used as a lawn and soil-and-water conservation plant, and can be used to improve soil, conserve soil and water, and be planted as a lawn and soil-and-water conservation plant along roadsides and in places that cannot be mowed. The stems of crown vetch plants grow creeping, which can effectively prevent rainwater scouring and prevent soil runoff. Abroad, crown vetch is mainly used for slope protection on both sides of highways and railways, bank stabilization of river embankments, maintenance of reservoir dams, and water and soil conservation on eroded slopes.
Forage use
Because the fresh grass of crown vetch is relatively tender and has high protein content, it is also a good feed for animal husbandry.
As a forage grass, crown vetch has luxuriant and tender stems and leaves, high yield and rich nutrient content; whether fresh grass or hay, both its nutritional value and its digestibility for ruminant livestock are not lower than alfalfa. Compared with alfalfa, sheep prefer to eat variable crown vetch. However, because it contains nitropropionic acid substances, it is toxic to monogastric livestock, so it is mainly used as forage for ruminant livestock; this is its limitation in use. It can also be used for cutting and making hay, green feeding, and grazing cattle and sheep. When green feeding and grazing cattle and sheep, in areas with a relatively mild climate, it can be used from late spring and early summer each year until November-December, so the green grass utilization period is long.
Note: China began introducing it in the 1970s; in production practice crown vetch contains toxins and can cause poisoning in monogastric animals.
Green manure effect
According to measurements, fresh crown vetch grass contains 75.8% moisture, N 2.58%, P2O5 0.66%, and K2O 1.22%. In addition to the nitrogen fixation of root nodules, it has good mowing characteristics; during the annual growing season from May to November it can be mowed and pressed green, with 2000-4000 kg of fresh grass per 667 sq m for the whole year. With timely mowing, it can be done 3 times each year, regrowing as it is cut, and turned into the soil or piled to rot and then incorporated into the soil. The first cutting in June presses 2000 kg of green material, the second in August 1000 kg, and the third in November 800-1200 kg. The mowing time can also be arranged according to the needs of orchard production.
Community structure: As long as crown vetch is cultivated for one year, it can form a rich crown vetch community. The average thickness of this community is 60-80 cm, the richness is 6-13, the branch density is 496-576 branches/sq m, and the dominance is 75%-86.7%. Compared with plots in the same orchard without crown vetch (the control), perennial malignant weeds are significantly reduced, and in orchards it plays a role in suppressing weeds; in particular, it has a very good suppressive effect on many malignant weeds such as thatch grass and mugwort.
Landscape uses of crown vetch
Crown vetch is a ground-cover plant with extremely strong resistance and soil-fixing ability. It spreads quickly, has strong coverage and strong stress resistance, and has a long flowering period (full bloom from May to June; after full bloom, sporadic flowering in Qianjiang can be extended to November). It can be planted in large quantities on slopes to prevent water and soil loss.
Crown vetch can also be planted in patches in gardens, and is a relatively good flowering ground-cover plant.
Flower language of crown vetch
Crown vetch flower language: humility.
Crown vetch divination: modesty and elegance are your traits. You seldom fail in handling matters; apart from carrying a bit of luck yourself, it is mainly because of your temperament. You are modest toward others and have objective analysis, so you will not let unpleasant events occur; add to that your aura, and you are already more than halfway to success.
Crown vetch motto: Women's infatuation with love is far more thorough than men's.
Crown vetch pictures
Care and management of crown vetch
Crown vetch is a perennial herbaceous plant with strong adaptability, vigorous growth and relatively few pests and diseases. Crown vetch has more than twenty years of application history in China and many years of application history in the United States. So how can crown vetch be grown well?
Crown vetch
Crown vetch likes a warm and humid climate, but because its root-tiller buds lie dormant about 20 cm below the ground surface, it has strong cold resistance and overwintering ability. In Xi'an the green period is about 220 days, and in Wuhan and Qianjiang it is about more than 300 days, remaining basically evergreen.
This grass needs a lot of water for growth, but because its root system is well developed, on a road slope in Shaanxi it can reach 1.4 m in one year and actually reach 4.8 m deep in two years. There can be more than a hundred lateral roots per square meter, and it is also relatively drought-tolerant; generally in places with annual precipitation of 400-450 mm it can grow normally even without irrigation conditions. It is not waterlogging-tolerant; after being submerged for several days the roots rot and the whole plant dies.
Crown vetch grows slowly at the seedling stage. If the issue of slope scouring is temporarily not considered, with strengthened management and care it can reach a coverage rate of more than 80% within six months. In order to help prevent water and soil loss as quickly as possible, according to different construction times and site conditions, mixing and sowing with grass species of the Poaceae family can cover more than 80% of the ground surface within 40 days, while crown vetch needs about two years to completely "eat up" the companion grass species and cover the ground surface. Once crown vetch covers the ground surface, it will remain green like a carpet for a long time with bright flower colors. Crown vetch has more than ten years of history on highways in Shaanxi Province and has been promoted to Hunan, Hubei, Henan, Hebei, Shanxi and other places. It has sixty or seventy years of use history on highways in the United States, with good feedback from all sides.