Akebia

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Akebia (lat. Akebia) - a small genus of plants, consisting of climbing vines, which are often called "climbers" in the literature. Their decorativeness is used in gardens when vertical landscaping is required. The inflorescences collected from purple flowers exude a light chocolate aroma, and the fruits with a jelly-like pulp were eaten with pleasure by Japanese children, not paying attention to the abundance of seeds inside.

Description

To count the plant species of the genus Akebia, you do not need a calculator, since botanists have counted only five species of fast-growing vines that can easily climb a support. The support can be man-made pergolas, high fences, walls of all kinds of buildings, from residential to outbuildings. Moreover, the coolness of the walls does not frighten the thermophilic vine, which was born in the tropics of East Asia. It is only important that the temperature is above the "plus 5" mark on the outdoor thermometer.

Simple leaves of the plant like to create a community of several pieces, forming a finger-like leaf on a long common petiole. Moreover, each individual leaf has its own petiole, shorter in length. The dark green surface of dense leaves is bare, leathery. The reverse side of the leaf is lighter green.

Violet, pink-brown, purple-brown flowers up to three cm in diameter form a fragrant inflorescence-cluster. There are female and male flowers in it, that is, Akebia is a monoecious plant, which greatly facilitates the task of continuing the presence of beautiful vines on the planet. Moreover, in some countries, Akebia feels like a full-fledged mistress, displacing other plants from the territory and forcing a person to enroll it in malicious weeds.

Ovate-oblong edible fruits of Akebia, up to 8 cm long, are coated with wax on the outside. In the translucent whitish pulp of the fruit, numerous seeds are located in slender dense rows. Although it is generally believed that the flesh of the Akebia fruit has a sweetish taste, it is rather tasteless. Adult Japanese with nostalgia remember how, as children, they feasted on the fruits of Akebia, because in those days there was not enough more traditional food. Maybe that's why the fruits seemed sweet.

What's in your name

Since Akebia was born in East Asia, including, it has long been growing in Japan, the Japanese sound of the plant's name was fixed in the Latin name, which today we pronounce as "Akebia", marveling at the bizarre combination of letters.

Growing

The Sunny East has brought up love for our Luminary in Akebia, which does not prevent the plant from feeling great at the cool shaded walls, which the owners are trying to hide behind a dense carpet of leaves and inflorescences with the aroma of appetizing chocolate.

In the tropics, the liana is accustomed to fertile, loose and moist soils, and therefore it will grow sluggishly on other soils, and things may not reach a fragrant flowering at all. When growing Akebia in flower pots in areas with cold winters, the pots are also filled with fertile soil with the addition of mineral fertilizer.

Although Akebia loves moist soil, experts recommend watering only young, not yet matured plants, and also when drought has settled in your area for a long period.

In order for the appearance of the vine to always please the grower, it is necessary to rid the plant of damaged and dried shoots. In areas with a temperate climate, after the end of flowering, the plant is cut at the root.

Loosening and mulching of the soil is encouraged.

Liana is propagated by cuttings or layering.

Akebia is resistant to pests, but succumbs to excess moisture and frost. Also, the vine grows very quickly, and therefore needs constant supervision so that it does not manage to displace other plants from the site.