At first glance, gladioli are not of particular interest, but when huge flowers bloom, densely covering the peduncle, it becomes clear why these plants deserve the love of flower growers. It is simply impossible to pass by such beauty without looking back, because the color of flowers can be very diverse - from the usual yellow or red, to rare green or blue.

In order for gladioli to bloom already in the year of planting, you need to know how to plant them correctly in the spring. In addition, the choice of planting material is also important, since often the lack of summer flowering is the result of acquiring the “wrong” bulbs.

How to choose bulbs for planting?

In gladiolus, the tuber is arranged in such a way that the stem is formed from the upper central kidney, and children grow from the lower one. When buying planting material, you need to pay attention to the size of the bulb. Too large specimens, which have a large bottom and a flat shape, are best avoided. This is what old gladioli look like, obsolete for 3-4 seasons. After that, they practically do not bloom, and even if planted correctly in the spring, there will be no peduncle.

If you need to bloom in the summer, you should not buy small baby bulbs. For reproduction, this is the most suitable option, only they will bloom next season.

The most suitable bulbs for planting are those that have already bloomed once. They are slightly elongated, with well-developed lower dormant buds.

Preparing bulbs for planting

You can plant gladioli in May, when the earth warms up enough. In April, the bulbs must first be prepared for planting:

1. Remove dry scales.
2. Cut out damaged areas (if they have a small affected area), cover the wounds with charcoal or grease with brilliant green.
3. Put on the windowsill to wake up the kidneys.

To speed up the growth of the roots, a week before planting, the bulbs can be put in a box and sprinkled with wet sawdust.

Directly on the day of planting, soak the gladioli for several hours in a weak solution of potassium permanganate. This will increase resistance to diseases.

How to plant gladiolus?

Proud beauties love low acid soil, good lighting, and regular watering. This must be taken into account when choosing a landing site. In addition, it is necessary to avoid areas where water stagnates and drafts walk. In a soil that never dries out, the bulbs will quickly rot, and gusts of wind will simply break the tall flower stalks.

A flower bed for gladioli should be prepared in the fall: add humus, superphosphate, and dig it up. In the spring, loosen the soil again and make holes, leaving a distance of at least 30 cm between them.

If the soil was not fertilized in autumn, you can put a little mineral fertilizer directly into the holes, adding sand as well. Bulbs should not be buried very deep, the optimal depth of the hole should be three times the height of the bulb itself.

We plant gladioli correctly - video

Spikes or gladiolus adorned gardens in ancient Rome. And today these majestic and insanely beautiful flowers are very popular. Their flowering at the end of summer and autumn can be seen in almost any garden, and schoolchildren give bouquets of gladiolus on September 1 to their teachers.

A corm plant from the Iris family is distinguished by a straight, dense stem, green leaves growing from the root pointed at the ends and a long flower spike, on which up to 20 buds can form. Depending on the variety, skewer flowers can be small and large, rarely or often located on the ear.

Thanks to the work of breeders, today there are a lot of varieties of gladioli, the flowers of which have a wide variety of colors. They can be plain red, yellow, white, pink, coral, two or three colors. The skewers bloom from mid-July until frost.

Preparation of gladiolus bulbs in spring

If you have not yet grown spazhniki on your site, and you do not have planting material, it can be easily purchased at a specialized store or on the market.

Attention! Buy only onions adapted to our climatic conditions! It is not recommended to buy Dutch bulbs grown in tropical conditions, since in our climate such plants in most cases bloom only in the first year or may not bloom at all.

It is necessary to plant the bulbs in the ground already with a sprouted sprout, therefore, three to four weeks before planting, they are taken out and cleaned of dense scales. Planting material must be inspected and destroyed affected and diseased bulbs. If the lesion is small, then it can be cut out and smeared with brilliant green.

For the germination of the shoot, the planting material is laid out in one row in a bright, warm place. The bulbs should be upside down.

On the day of planting, gladiolus must be processed to protect them from fungal diseases and pests. To do this, you can use a 0.3% solution of the drug Fundazol and soak the bulbs in it for an hour, then rinse under running water. If there is no special preparation, then use potassium permanganate, half a gram of which is diluted in one liter of water. In this solution, the planting material is kept for 30 minutes and planted in a flower bed without rinsing.

Children of gladioli start preparing two weeks before planting. For this you need:

• select children with noticeable root buds and a diameter of about 8 mm;
• release the onions from the shell;
• spread out in diffused light;
• on the day of planting, sprouted babies are disinfected for 9 hours in a solution of potassium permanganate (one gram per liter of water).

Growing gladiolus outdoors

When choosing a site for planting a skewer, you should remember:

1. It is recommended to change the planting site of gladioli every two to three years, since these plants do not like to grow in the same area for several years in a row. Be sure to observe crop rotation, otherwise the plants will get sick.
2. About once every three years, skewers need to change the composition of the soil. For example, they can be grown for three years on a site with alumina, and then on sandy loam soil.
3. A flower bed for planting gladioli should be in a well-lit place, otherwise flowering will come late or not at all.
4. Groundwater should not lie high on the site, otherwise the bulbs may rot.
5. A bed with flowers should be located in a ventilated place, otherwise there is a possibility of plants being affected by fungal diseases.
6. Skewers grow best on sandy and loamy soils. Therefore, when digging a bed in sandy soils, it is recommended to add clay, and in clay soils - sand.
7. The acidity of the soil is very important for gladioli, which should be in the range of 6.5-6.8 pH. Plants in alkaline soil will turn yellow and grow poorly. If the soil is acidic, you need to add dolomite flour or chalk to it (150 grams per 1 square meter of beds), otherwise the plants will be affected by fusarium, the flowers will not open, and the leaves will begin to darken and wither.

Having chosen a site for planting gladioli, it should be dug deep in the fall and fertilized every square meter:

• potassium chloride - 30 g;
• superphosphate - 100 g.

In the spring, the flower bed is leveled and potash fertilizers are applied to the soil.

When to plant gladiolus

Planting dates depend on the climate of the region and weather conditions.

It is important! The bulb moved from a warm room to cold soil will feel bad, so planting should be done only after the earth warms up to +10 degrees at a depth of 10-15 cm. Otherwise, the plants may not bloom or bloom late.

In the southern regions, gladioli can be planted in open ground as early as late April - early May, and in the Urals and Siberia from about mid-May to early June.

How deep to plant gladiolus

So that gladioli do not fall, they need to be planted at a certain depth. If the bulb is placed shallowly, then a tall plant with a lot of flowers will begin to collapse and may break. To prevent this from happening, small onions are placed at a depth of 8-10 cm, and large ones - 10-15 cm.

The depth of the gladioli should be equal to four diameters of the planted bulb.

For planting gladioli in a flower bed, grooves are made with a distance of about 20 cm, into which onions with sprouts of 6-8 cm are placed. The distance between plants depends on the size of the bulbs - small ones are planted with a distance of about 8 cm, and large ones - at least 15 cm.

Planting material is placed in the grooves on a layer of sand, covered from above, first with sand, and then with soil. Landings are recommended to be mulched with a five-centimeter layer of humus, which will protect them from overheating, frost and dehydration.

In order to prevent the appearance of fungal diseases when planting onions, you can put moss-sphagnum impregnated with fungicide.

How to care for gladioli

To get a beautifully flowering gladiolus flower garden, you must follow the rules for caring for gladioli throughout the season. They include:

1. Regular watering. In the absence of rain, the plants are watered once a week, pouring two or three buckets of water per square meter of beds. If the weather is dry and hot, you may need to water every three days. It is better to pour water in the aisles. When the skewers fade, reduce the frequency of watering, and then stop altogether.
2. Weeding and loosening. Beds with skewers must be freed from weeds and loosened. The loosening procedure is carried out approximately every ten days.
3. Top dressing of gladioli. Plants are fed until mid-August three times. Once a second sheet will appear, plantings are watered with a solution of 10 liters of water and 20 grams of carbamite, which contains the nitrogen necessary for the leaves. Phosphorus, potassium and nitrogen are added to the soil when 5 or 6 leaves appear(per 1 sq. meter - 15-20 grams of potassium sulfate, ammonium sulfate and superphosphate). Gladiolus need potassium and phosphorus to bloom, so after the appearance of the peduncle potassium chloride (20 grams) and superphosphate (30 grams) are added for each square meter of the garden.
4. Foliar top dressing. It will increase decorativeness and improve flowering by spraying the leaves with a solution of mineral complex fertilizers. Plants planted in sandy loam soil respond very well to foliar feeding.
5. Fertilizing gladiolus with organic matter. Mineral top dressings can be alternated with organic fertilizers, which are applied only in liquid form. It is recommended to use organic matter at the beginning of the growth of skewers. It is best to prepare organic fertilizers from a solution of chicken manure (a bucket of manure is diluted with 1.5 winds of water and insisted for ten days). Before use, each liter of infusion is diluted in ten liters of water.
6. supports. No matter how deep the bulbs are planted, profusely flowering plants can still fall over, so it is recommended to install supports or arrange a trellis near them.
7. Pest Prevention. Spikes are very fond of thrips, so insecticidal preparations are used to protect plants. Plantings are treated with a solution from Aktara or Inta-Vira during the appearance of flower stalks.

Cut gladioli in the morning or evening, using a sharp knife or secateurs. In order to save the bulb, which should still grow, after the cut, at least 4 leaves and the rest of the peduncle deeply hidden in them should remain.

When to dig up gladiolus bulbs

35-45 days after flowering, that is, starting from mid-September, you can start digging up the skewer bulbs. First of all, early-flowering varieties are dug. Work is carried out in dry weather. First, the stems are cut with a secateurs or a knife, then the onions are taken out of the ground, and the roots are cut off.

The bulbs are carefully cleaned from the ground and the children are separated from them. Healthy onions should be covered with dense integumentary scales. They are placed in a sieve, washed under running water, treated with a solution of Fundazol for 20 minutes, rinsed first with plain water, then with a solution of potassium permanganate (3%) and laid out to dry.

The gladiolus bulbs are dried for 10 days at a temperature of +25 to +30 degrees, then they are kept at a temperature of +20 degrees for a month. In dried onions, the dirty upper scales are removed and put away for storage.

How to store gladiolus bulbs

So that in winter the skewers do not germinate, they are stored in a room with a humidity of 60% and a temperature not lower than +5 and not higher than +10 degrees. The bulbs are placed in boxes with a mesh bottom and cleaned in a basement or cellar with ventilation. If there are no boxes, you can use bags of nylon stockings or tights.

What if there is no basement or cellar? Planting material can be wrapped in paper, folded into airtight containers and placed in the vegetable section of the refrigerator. In the spring, the onions are unwrapped, dried, wrapped again in paper and put away in a cooler place in the refrigerator.

If gladiolus bulbs are stored at home at room temperature, they begin to dry out. Therefore, in the spring, before planting in the ground, they must be soaked in a growth stimulator.

What to do with gladiolus babies

Children dug out and separated from large bulbs should be sorted by size and variety. Medium tubers have a diameter of about 6 mm, and large - more than 8 mm.

Small onions must be stored at a temperature within + 5 ... + 6 degrees. Tubers stored in room conditions at higher temperatures will lose their germination capacity. Therefore, in the absence of a basement, the onions are placed in the refrigerator. They should be stored in paper bags.

With proper planting and cultivation of gladioli, from mid-August, multi-colored buds will begin to bloom in the flower beds, which will delight with their beauty until the very cold.

The duration of their flowering, the size of the peduncle and the decorative effect of the plant itself largely depend on compliance with the rules for planting gladioli. Gladiolus owes its name to the ancient Roman patricians, who, 300 years before our era, grew lush arrows in their gardens. And today, these plants decorate dachas and flower beds, delight parents and children with luxurious bouquets on Knowledge Day.

Before planting gladioli in open ground, it will be necessary to carry out a series of preparatory work, and it is they who will ensure successful germination of young sprouts. It will also be important to choose a planting site, care for the plant after germination and the advice of experienced flower growers.

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Bulb storage and preparation

The optimal place for storing corms is a moderately humid basement with a temperature of +5 - +9. Here they are stacked in boxes with a slatted bottom so that the bulbs are ventilated. On average, once a month, planting material is inspected and spoiled tubers, soft and blackened, are discarded.

It is better to store gladioli in the apartment in the bottom drawer of the refrigerator, wrapped in paper and putting wrappers in sealed cellophane. Somewhere in the spring, the paper will get wet (the bulbs will begin to release moisture), then they need to be unfolded, dried for several days, and then repackaged in paper and folded into cellophane. If the bulbs are left at room temperature, they can germinate after 35-40 days and this will ruin all storage efforts.

Approximately 20 days before planting, the corms are taken out of storage and taken out to a brightened place. However, you can not place them under the direct rays of the sun, the light should be diffused. In the same period, the tubers are peeled, the peel on them should be dense and shiny, spoiled, moldy, soft bulbs are thrown away.

Those that have minor (point) damage can be treated: you need to remove the damage with a sharp knife, and then treat the cut out place with brilliant green. Before planting, a crust forms on it, and the plant will sprout roots perfectly.

The bulbs are disinfected, for this you need a solution of potassium permanganate (2 g per 4 liters of water) or "Fundazol" (0.3% aqueous solution). Planting material is soaked in it immediately before planting for 1 hour. You can also 2 days before, then you need to soak for 8 hours, and then remove the tubers, rinse and dry. Before planting, the bulb must have a bud no lower than 3 mm or a sprout from 1 to 10 cm.

View of a bulb ready for planting in open ground



Disembarkation dates

For beginner gardeners, it is worth clarifying that the average planting time for gladioli is the end of April until the beginning of June (for Central Russia). But here it is very important to observe the following rules:

1. 1. There should be no frost in the morning.
2. 2. The soil at a depth of 10–15 cm should warm up to +10.

Failure to follow these rules will provoke late flowering or plants and will not bloom at all.

If the planting dates are observed, early varieties will throw out flower stalks in early August, and late ones at the end of September.

If we consider in detail the dates for other regions, then for the Urals they will shift to mid-May, during the same period early varieties should be planted in the Moscow region.

In Siberia and the Leningrad region, it is advisable to plant seedlings. This will allow you to get flower stalks before the onset of frost.

To achieve earlier flowering, you can warm the soil with warm water, but then after planting, you will have to mulch the area well with humus. If there is a threat of frost, it must be smoked, perhaps at first the seedlings will need to be covered with agrofiber. However, only those gardeners who have already grown these flowers on their site should plant gladioli in this way, and for beginners it is better to use the standard scheme.

In order to continue the flowering period of plants, you can use the following recommendations:

• Plant varieties with different flowering periods.
• Plant one variety with an interval of 10-15 days twice or thrice.
• Plant bulbs of various sizes, but be sure to follow the planting sequence.



Under the winter

It is possible to plant planting material of gladioli before winter only if it is possible to provide it with a soil temperature of at least +2 in winter. When the soil cools below -2, gladiolus bulbs die.

If you really want to get flowers ahead of schedule, you can use a pot (3-5 l), planting the bulbs in compliance with all the rules for planting in it and putting the first time on an insulated balcony. However, after germination, it will be necessary to provide him with a temperature and light regime, and this is not easy. After the threat of frost has passed, the pot can be taken out into the street, the green skewer will beautifully decorate the flower bed.



Growing gladiolus seedlings

This method is used if flower stalks are needed much ahead of time. It is also suitable for the northern regions, since summer is very short here, and frosts from spring last for a long time. For him, first (one and a half months before planting in the ground), the bulbs are planted in sawdust. Germinate planting material on the windowsill (illuminating the plants artificially).

After the skewer rises by 10-15 cm, they are transplanted into cups (0.5 l), for which they use a special soil for planting flowers. Before planting seedlings, the soil in containers should be watered with a weak solution of potassium permanganate. Then the roots are placed in the ground, but the neck of the peduncle is covered only with wet sawdust. Then grow again on the windowsill.

They are planted in a permanent place of growth in the country, cutting the cups, only after the soil warms up above +10.

Site selection

For growing gladioli, the right choice of site is very important. In the northern regions, this must be a well-lit garden bed without drafts. In the Middle lane, you can plant gladioli in shaded areas, but when shaded from the south, they will bloom 10-15 days later, and when shaded from the east, at least a week.

In hot southern areas, gladioli can be planted in light shade. This will save them from the heat at noon.

The optimum acidity of the soil is pH 6.5–6.8. Composition - chernozem or well-fertilized loamy soil, sandy loam. Gladioli do not like a lot of moisture; water should not linger on the site.

Plants are not planted after tuberous and asters.

Soil preparation

Soil preparation can be carried out in the fall, if the gladiolus bed has already been determined, or in the spring, immediately before planting the tubers. If the earth is dug up in the fall, then phosphorus and potash fertilizers are applied. At this time, the soil is buried more deeply in order to preserve moisture.

In the spring, the land is cultivated by 18–20 cm. After that, it is leveled with a rake, and then grooves or holes are made. Fertilizers are applied after germination.

The optimal depth will be calculated from the diameter of the bulbs. Experienced gardeners plant them to a depth of 4 plant diameters. For large bulbous bulbs, this is 10–15 cm. For medium-sized bulbs, the depth of the hole will be 8–10, and for children - up to 8. The wider the row spacing, the more nutrients the plants will receive. Between large bulbs in a row, the distance should exceed 20 cm, and between rows from 25. For smaller planting material, the distance can be made smaller.

Planting plants too deep is not necessary, this will prevent you from getting strong plants and abundant flowering. If you plant the bulbs finely, then the skewer will not be so strong, and so that the flower stalks do not fall, they will have to be tied up.

It is worth planting separately large, medium bulbs and children. Large plants will take away nutrients from smaller ones - they may not bloom.

Process

Having made holes, 2 cm of river sand or sphagnum moss are placed on their bottom. And already on this pillow lay the bulbs. Then, planting material is sprinkled on top with loose earth and watered abundantly with warm water.

If groundwater comes close to the surface, it will be right to make beds, but they are categorically not suitable in a hot climate (peduncles will dry out).

For irrigation between rows, it is good to dig furrows (up to 5 cm). It is carried out once a week, but plentiful (10 l per m 2). After the shoots appear, the soil is mulched with humus.

It doesn't matter how you got the bulbs - whether they were donated by a neighbor or bought from a high-end store - their preparation is the same, regardless of origin. Two to three weeks before the scheduled planting date, planting material should be cleaned of scales covering the bulbs and inspected for pests wintering under them or diseases.

Healthy corms have a shiny surface, a dense structure, thick tubercles, from which the root system will develop, thick buds that have hatched.

Soft and covered with mold or ulcers should be burned immediately so as not to breed pathogens of various sores on their territory. If, on the whole, the planting material is healthy, but in some places you notice signs of scab or fusarium, it can still be cured! With a sharp knife, dark brown spots on the surface of the bulbs are carefully cut off, and the cuts are smeared with brilliant green. Wounds will have time to heal, but we will not see diseases! Before planting, corms must be germinated. To do this, they are laid out with the kidneys up in a warm, well-lit place, protected from direct sunlight.

In order not to cause increased and premature root growth, moisture should be avoided on planting material. Gladiolus roots are very fragile, and when planting, no matter how hard you try, break them anyway, which will lead to stunted plant growth. A properly prepared corm will have time to grow sprouts up to 10 cm and small root tubercles that have not yet had time to develop into real roots. Material that has not shown any signs of life during the entire germination period is simply rejected.

Surely, you are already tired of waiting for the right weather, and you want to see the sprouts of your favorite flowers as soon as possible. Well, as soon as the soil warms up to +10 ° С (mid-April - early May), it's time to start planting. Immediately before starting, the planting material should be pickled in a solution Fitosporina or Oxychoma about half an hour, which helps to get rid of invisible pests and pathogens.

For gladioli, you need to choose a place well lit and protected from the northern winds. Waterlogged lowlands on the north side and - the worst choice! Loose, moisture-absorbing soil should not be too heavy. The bed has been dug up since autumn along with rotted compost. In no case should you fertilize the soil with fresh manure! Plants are planted in groups in trenches of different depths, depending on the size of the planting material. For large corms– it is 15cm for medium– up to 9 cm, and even smaller trenches for "kids".

They are planted at the same distance. The bottom of the hole is sprinkled with sand, then the bulbs are laid out, slightly pressing them into the soil, sprinkled with wood ash and sand again, watered with a heated solution of potassium permanganate, and only after that they are covered with the top layer of soil. Sand is far from mandatory, but it optimizes the composition of heavy soil well and helps in the fall to easily extract planting material along with the formed corms. from gladioli of different varieties alone - a very spectacular decoration of your site!

So, you already know how to plant gladioli in the spring. The hardest part lies ahead – waiting for the first shoots! You can speed up this process by building a greenhouse over the bed. In this case, you will not need to worry about return frosts and cover or earth up the landing site. When the gladioli germinate, the surface of the beds is mulched with a layer of humus or dry forest foliage. Mulch performs several tasks at once - it protects the soil from drying out, overheating and hypothermia, and also suppresses weeds and serves as top dressing for subsequent years.

Wintering in open ground, like dahlias, gladioli cannot. To enjoy the flowering of these plants, choose varieties with early flowering periods for your site, because with worsening weather, the plants may not only not bloom, but also not give offspring the next year - it simply will not have time to ripen. In the fall, when the foliage turns yellow, you can dig up the bulbs for storage and repeat the steps that will invariably lead you to a positive result.