How do you care for a potted gardenia at home so it grows well?
The gardenia has evergreen leaves all year round, and its flowers are fragrant and elegantly understated, making it an important ornamental plant for balconies and courtyards. There are many varieties of gardenia. The gardenia likes warm, humid and sunny environments, is relatively cold-tolerant and tolerant of partial shade, fears waterlogging, and requires loose, fertile, acidic sandy loam soil. There are eight common varieties of gardenia, such as large-leaf gardenia, water gardenia, ovate-leaf gardenia and so on. To grow gardenias well, you first need to understand and learn the gardenia's cultivation methods and precautions, along with related knowledge. Below, Huacaole shares with you how to grow potted gardenias at home.
How do you care for a potted gardenia at home?
Gardenia cultivation methods and precautions
1. Choose suitable potting soil
Gardenias like acidic soil, with a suitable pH value of 5 to 6, so prepare suitable soil before planting. The growing medium is usually leaf mold and peat soil plus half garden soil; do not use coal cinders.
Gardenias have strong vitality. A small seedling can grow from a few centimeters to several tens of centimeters, so repot according to the size of the plant. When the plant's stem length is 2 to 3 times the diameter of the flowerpot rim, it needs repotting. When repotting, promptly prune old roots, replace half the soil, water thoroughly, and place it in partial shade for a week. After new buds grow, move it into the sunlight.
2. Fertilize reasonably
Gardenias like fertilizer. When planting, add rotted cake fertilizer to the soil as a base fertilizer.
During the growing season, use fertilizer water made by fermenting cake fertilizer and ferrous sulfate, and water it once a week. A full-nutrient organic liquid fertilizer can also be used.
During the bud stage, apply topdressing 1 to 2 times, watering with a potassium dihydrogen phosphate aqueous solution, which can make the flowers larger and the fragrance richer.
Stop fertilizing when the summer temperature is above 35°C or the autumn temperature is above 15°C.
3. Watering
Gardenias like a moist and humid environment. During the growing period from April to September, keep the potting soil moist and water according to the principle of watering when dry and stopping when wet. At night, you can mist the leaves to wet them and maintain humidity. If the plant grows too vigorously, do not water at night; water after the sun comes out in the morning.
In alkaline-water areas of the north, when watering, let tap water stand for a day before watering. Every 3 to 5 days, water with a little citric acid aqueous solution, which can keep the leaves emerald green.
4. Give it plenty of sunlight
Gardenias need sufficient sunlight to grow, but they cannot be exposed to scorching sun. If kept in partial shade for a long time, the flowering branches become weak, thin and elongated.
5. Winter protection
Although gardenias are cold-tolerant, potted gardenias will suffer root damage after going through a severe winter, and recovery in spring is slower. However, if placed indoors with heating, where the temperature is higher and light is insufficient, the plant's growth slows and it blooms later the following year. The best method is to place the potted plant in a 5°C environment to let it go dormant, or wrap the flowerpot with insulating material and place it outdoors in a sunny, wind-sheltered spot to overwinter.
6. Prune appropriately
When the main stem of the gardenia grows to 20 cm, pinch off the top bud and leave 3 to 4 branches to encourage branching. After flowering each year, prune lightly and cut off weak and diseased branches. However, in spring, gardenias must not be cut back at the branch tips, otherwise it will be difficult for them to bloom that year.