2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
Cerastium (lat. Cerastium) - winter-hardy and drought-resistant light-loving perennial from the Clove family. Its second name is yaskolka. The Latin name of the plant is due to the shape of its fruits - they look like boxes resembling a horn, and the Greek words keras, from which the Latin name comes from, just means "horn".
Description
Cerastium is an annual or perennial plant, the height of which ranges from fifteen to thirty centimeters. And the branchy or simple stems of this plant can be either creeping or ascending. Small whole leaves of cerastium are always opposite and densely pubescent.
White flowers of cerastium reach two centimeters in diameter and form incredibly attractive corymbose inflorescences. As a rule, you can admire the flowering of this handsome man in late spring and early summer season.
In total, the genus of cerastium includes about a hundred plants.
Where grows
Cerastium is most widely distributed in the temperate regions of North America and Eurasia. It can also be found in North Africa and in the highlands of South America and Africa.
Usage
In ornamental gardening, Bieberstein's cerastium and felt cerastium are most often used. True, many other varieties of cerastium can often be seen in botanical gardens or in the collections of flora lovers.
Cerastium leaves and flowers bring a neutral whitish tone to various garden compositions, allowing you to create magnificent combinations with other flowers of a wide variety of shades - purple, pink, blue-violet, orange, yellow, and so on. Cerastium is excellent for planting on slopes, on rocky hills, as well as in low curbs. It goes especially well with armeria or dark-leaved bells. And in mixborders it is recommended to plant it in the foreground. In addition, cerastium is also an excellent solution for container planting!
It is best to try to combine cerastium with other drought-resistant plants, planting this handsome man in an elevated area in well-drained soils, to which sand has previously been added. In this case, the plants practically do not need even minimal care, since weeds in such flower beds always turn out to be uncompetitive.
Growing and caring
Cerastium can boast not only drought resistance and light-requiring, but also absolute undemanding to soil fertility. It is best to plant this plant in well-heated areas that are not subject to stagnant moisture, ideally on the southern slopes. And being planted on dryish poor soils, cerastium perfectly resists all kinds of weeds on them. If it is planned to introduce any organic matter into the soil, then it is best to do this about ten days before planting.
Cerastium does not need feeding at all, and watering is required for this plant only in especially dry periods.
Immediately after flowering, the shoots of overgrown specimens are recommended to be pruned - this approach will contribute to the formation of more lush compact clumps, which in turn will give the beautiful plant even greater decorative effect.
Reproduction of cerastium is usually carried out by dividing the bushes in early spring, as well as sowing before winter, by sowing seeds in spring (already at the end of the summer season, seedlings will delight with their first flowering!) Or summer cuttings. By the way, it is recommended to renew the planting of cerastium every three or four years!
