Botanical portrait of hibiscus
Plants from the Malvian family - hibiscus - have received their numerous names due to growth sites. Their homeland is considered South-East Asia, but they grow freely in Africa and the South American continent. In America, they form on the wet floodplain meadows whole thickets, lushly covered with flowers. For a great love of moisture there they are called "marsh mallow".Most representatives of the genus Hibiscus are perennial deciduous or evergreen shrubs, rarely small trees. In nature, they number about 300 species.
Hibiscus is a Chinese rose native to southern China and northern India. He is bred in these countries everywhere, but in the wild he is no longer there. It is a tree-like shrub or tree with a height of up to 5 m, with a brownish, sometimes almost black bark on old shoots. There are also dwarf hibiscuses - just above 40 cm in size.
Leaves are bright green, jagged along the edge, up to 15 cm, regular, petiolate, ovate or oval, glabrous, shiny. Flowers are simple and terry, up to 15 cm in diameter, a variety of shades, ranging from yellowish white and gently pink to bright fiery red and purple-purple. Flowers of simple varieties are similar in shape and size to flowers of simple mallow. These are funnel-shaped, fairly large inflorescences, in which the stamens are joined in a peculiar tubule protruding from the center of the flower. Unlike the mallow - a flower rather rude - the petals of the Chinese rose are delicate, thin, like corrugated tissue paper. Their century is short: a day or two, and the coronals fall off. The natural flowering time of the Chinese rose is winter, but in culture it can bloom almost all year round.
The Sudanese rose( Hibiscus sabdariffa), whose flowers are called carcade, come from north-eastern Africa. Contrary to the name, elite raw materials for a carcade drink are supplied not from arid Sudan, but from the regions of Upper Egypt and the mouth of the Nile. For the cultivation of food varieties, a high moisture content in the soil, a high air temperature, and for flowering - also a longitude of at least 12 hours are required.
Another species is the Syrian rose, ketmia( Hibiscus syriacus), native to China and India. It is a deciduous tree, often growing with a bush, with a grayish stem, egg-shaped bright green leaves resembling birch leaves, and with flowers of a different color ranging from white to crimson, sometimes bicolor, simple and terry, which are smaller than those of the Chinese rose. We grow it as a houseplant. Syrian hibiscus grows rather slowly,
piety and fruiting from three to four years of age. May, under favorable conditions, live up to 100 years. It is perfect for growing and outdoors. Gardeners are happy to use ketmiya for solitary( single) and group plantings, to create hedges and alleys. Growing, bushes become more winter-hardy and can withstand short-term temperature drops down to -22 ° С.Hibiscus Syrian is widely distributed in the southern regions of Russia and is well-known to local fans of exotic plants. Propagation by cuttings, layers, grafting, seeds.
Not so long ago in the indoor culture appeared hibiscus hybrid. Its flowers are like the flowers of a Chinese rose, the leaves look like maple leaves. For the winter, the upper part of the plant dies off, and in the earth there remain winter powerful korneklubni. Hybrid hibiscus hybrids that can be successfully grown in the open ground, even in our mid-zone - in the conditions of a rather harsh winter are deduced.
Propagates by dividing bushes or cuttings.
On sale you can find seeds of hibiscus ternate;it is an annual plant from North and Central Africa. For punctuality, this type of hibiscus was called a "flower clock": its elegant flowers open at 8 am and close at 9 pm.
Hibiscuses in nature grow long, in the room conditions their age can with good care reach 20 years. The soil is not very demanding, but it must be well drained. In warm regions, hibiscus grows well even in ecologically disadvantaged cities - it is so smoke-and gas-resistant.