2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
Woodruff (lat. Asperula) - shade-tolerant winter-hardy perennial from the Madder family. The second name is asperula. This name comes from the Latin word asperulus, which translates as "slightly rough", which is not far from the truth: the plant is really characterized by rough leaves and stems, and in some species, the fruits can also be rough.
Description
Woodruff can be both an annual and a perennial, moreover, sometimes there are even specimens with lignified stem bases. This plant is quite low - as a rule, its height is limited to the range from ten centimeters to half a meter. Powerful creeping woodruff rhizomes are located in the immediate vicinity of the soil surface, and it is from them that numerous stems extend. In this case, shoots can be both creeping and erect, sometimes slightly lignified in the lower part.
The whorled leaves of this plant are formed by eight lanceolate segments. These leaves are located along the entire length of the stems, from their bases to the tops. Small woodruff flowers are usually colored pink, red, yellow, white or even blue and form extremely attractive inflorescences. As for the fruits of this plant, they look like nuts splitting into two parts.
In total, the woodruff genus has about two hundred species, while the data on the total number of species from different specialists vary quite a lot: some argue that this plant has only ninety species, while others call all kinds of numbers up to two hundred.
Where grows
Most often, woodruff can be found in Australia, Asia and Europe. Moreover, it grows best on the mountain slopes of Eurasia and Australia.
Usage
Woodruff is quite actively used in ornamental gardening, while most often it is grown as a ground cover plant in shady gardens. And this plant also allows you to create amazingly beautiful patterned ground covers under the canopy of trees. This is especially true for those areas where the lawn grows!
Woodruff also boasts a number of medicinal properties - infusions prepared on its basis have powerful diaphoretic, diuretic, sedative and antiseptic properties. Moreover, this handsome man is an excellent honey plant, constantly attracting a huge number of bees!
Some hostesses have found use for dried leaves and woodruff flowers - it turns out that they are endowed with the ability to scare away moths!
Growing and caring
Woodruff will grow best in shady areas, on fairly loose humus soil with a small amount of clay. But in terms of care, or rather the absence of the need for any care, this handsome man long ago gained fame as a typical lazy plant!
Growing quite quickly, woodruff displaces all kinds of weeds with a truly lightning speed and, at the same time, practically does not require maintenance! And each bush of a plant can easily live in the same place for up to ten years! And the woodruff can boast of a very strong "immunity" - this handsome man is not at all interested in pests and is practically not susceptible to all sorts of "flower" diseases!
As for the reproduction of woodruff, it is carried out by sowing freshly harvested seeds in the autumn. However, some gardeners successfully propagate this plant by dividing bushes or cuttings.
