Pine ordinary in your area

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For people who are tired of the quick change of elegant green foliage to yellow, of the problems associated with the annual collection and burning or disposal of leaf litter and the need for constant and annual pruning, aimed at creating a beautiful appearance of the tree, we recommend planting conifers, specifically - ordinary pine, which we will talk about today.

Pine, like most conifers, remains decorative throughout the year. Common pine (Pinus sylvestris), perhaps the most striking representative of the pine family, and it possesses not only a chic and magnificent crown, but also is a source of a very pleasant and air-healing aroma of pine needles.

However, taking into account all the advantages of ordinary pine as an ornamental plant, we still do not observe the presence of this culture in each plot. Of course, if the plot is small - this is one thing, but it happens that for quite large sections of ordinary pine for some reason there is no. Perhaps it’s rare to find common pine on a plot because it is believed that it is difficult in agricultural technology, but in reality it turns out completely wrong.

Pine description

Scots pine is a coniferous and evergreen tree. It belongs to the Sosnovy family, to which also belong the larch and pseudolarch, unlike the pine, they discard the needles that have served their term during the growing season and look rather ugly in the late autumn, winter and early spring.

In its natural habitat, Scots pine grows quite actively and often exceeds a height of five tens of meters. Common pine lives on the site for a very long time - over five hundred years.

As you know, pine leaves do not, they are replaced by needles 6-8 cm long. Each needle is attached in pairs to the twig. The needles are not eternal, each lives from three to five years, then is replaced by a new one. Typically, the needles located in the crown on the south side live less than those located on the north side.

Cones in an ordinary obovate pine, usually drooping and consisting of scales, behind which the seeds are hidden. At the beginning of their development, the cones are very dense and tightly closed, but over time, their scales open, which means that seeds have ripened in the cones.

For more information about other types and varieties of pine, see: Pine - types and varieties

Pine growing: planting

Pine planting time

In general, not only ordinary pine, but many other conifers should be planted either in the spring (at the very end of April and early May), or in the autumn (at the end of September and before the beginning of October). If you plant an ordinary pine on a plot in late autumn, there is a risk that it will not be able to adapt quickly on the plot, and therefore be ready for winter, and the seedling may die.

Pine Seedling Selection

As for the common pine in particular, and most conifers in general, when choosing planting material for these crops, you should focus solely on the purchase of seedlings with a closed root system, that is, placed in a container.

The advantages of such seedlings are very significant: perfectly developing the root system, which was not tormented by transplants, a solid lump of land of the container in which the root system is enclosed - all this will allow plants to be planted on the site without a problem, as well as useful microorganisms in symbiosis with ordinary pine, which stored on the root system of seedlings placed in containers.

If when buying pine seedlings, whose roots are wrapped in ordinary burlap or bags, you are assured that the bacteria on the roots are alive, do not trust such sellers. The fact is that these beneficial bacteria die after a quarter of an hour in the open air. For the same reason, when transshipment from the container into the planting hole, you should not hesitate, the seedling should be immersed in the soil as soon as possible after extraction from the container, which is why it is important to dig planting holes in advance when planting ordinary pine from a closed root system.

It’s not worthwhile, however, to think that if the bacteria die, the seedling will come to an end, in fact it’s not so, you can plant an ordinary pine seedling in the soil even after it has been lying with an open root system for more than a quarter of an hour, but in this case the risk that the seedling does not take root in a new place will be higher.

In addition, when choosing a pine seedling in a nursery, do not chase their large sizes, firstly, it is significantly expensive (from $ 1,000 and above), and secondly, the older the seedling, the risk that it will not take root in a new place will be significantly higher. Pay attention to pine seedlings of five years of age, they are twice as cheap and take root ten times better.

Pine planting site

The ordinary pine will grow remarkably and develop steadily in a well-lit area, but it will feel quite good in a rare shade. If the ordinary pine is planted in full shadow, then there it will develop much worse, it can grow one-sided or curved, because its shoots will literally reach for the light.

After the place is chosen, you need to start manufacturing the landing pit. The size of the pine pit can be a couple of centimeters wider and deeper than the container, so that drainage and nutrient soil can be poured to the walls and base.

When planting, try to choose a place under the ordinary pine tree without stagnation of melt or rain water, because this plant does not tolerate excess moisture. Since we remembered the drainage, be sure to lay it on the bottom of the pit 4-6 cm thick, it can be pebbles, broken brick or expanded clay, it does not matter.

On top of the drainage layer you need to put a nutrient layer of soil, which should consist of a mixture of nutrient soil, flavored with turf soil, river sand and humus in equal proportions with the addition of a teaspoon of nitroammophoska. This composition must be mixed well and put in a thin layer (2 cm is the maximum) on the drainage layer.

Pine planting

Next, you need to be very careful so as not to destroy the earthen lump, cut the container and set the earthen lump with pine seedlings in the prepared hole. The key to success here is precisely the installation of a seedling in the pit, without affecting the earthen lump.

When planting an ordinary pine tree, try to place it in a hole so that the root neck of the pine tree, as a result, even after the subsidence of the soil, is at the level of the soil surface, therefore, after planting, the soil needs to be well compacted, so that even if soil sediment happens, it will be minimal . On loose soils, which over time can noticeably settle, seedlings of common pine need to be planted so that the root neck is even slightly above the surface of the soil; It’s not worth worrying: in a month she (the neck) will evenly level with the ground.

After the final planting, a pine seedling should be poured with a bucket of water at room temperature and the surface should be mulched with peat or humus in a couple of centimeters in order to preserve moisture in the soil. When watering, you can not only moisten the soil, but also spray the crown from the spray, do not forget that conifers love to "bathe".

Pine Growing: Care

About watering, ordinary pine, especially at a young age, is very demanding for watering, so drying of the soil should not be allowed. In addition, the pine tree is not heroically resistant to bright sunlight and frost, therefore, shading and shelter are needed, but adult plants, already from the fifth year, do not need such protection.

Watering pine

Irrigation rates largely depend on various periods of the plant's life. So, young, just planted trees require watering about once a week. In this case, watering should be carried out with a large amount of moisture, pouring under each tree, depending on the presence of natural moisture in the form of rain, from one bucket to three buckets (for each). Plants are more mature, that is, the next year after planting, you can water only a couple of times during the entire warm season, but in this case, depending on the presence of natural rainfall in the form of rain, from six to nine buckets of water at room temperature should be poured . As we mentioned above, do not forget to process from the spray gun the crown of the common pine, she loves bathing. Irrigation irrigation, that is, moistening the crown itself must be carried out in the evening, when the sun has already hidden behind the horizon. Bathing crown pine ordinary can be done at least every evening.

Pine dressing

Adult plants of Scots pine can be fed without any need for nutrition, but only the plant that is enough will form an ideal crown. For coniferous crops, and ordinary pine here is not an exception at all, just an ideal fertilizing is compost (it is best to bring it in the spring). Before making compost, it is necessary to loosen the soil in a near-stem zone for a couple of centimeters of depth and add compost to the loosened soil, evenly distributing about 150-200 g of compost per square meter, after which it is advisable to cover it with a small layer of soil. If the weather is dry, then the soil before making compost, but after loosening, it is also necessary to water well.

As for mineral top dressing, it is enough to use them once in the warm season, approximately in the middle of it, by spreading the fertilizer in dry form along the near-stem strip of the plant, and then abundant watering. Quite often, nitroammophoskos is a good complex fertilizer for common pine - you need to make an amount of a match box for each plant.

Pine weeding

Trunk circle (many people think that it’s possible to completely forget about a pine tree after planting a tree on a plot), but in reality this is not quite so. Until the plant is five years old, and it is considered still young, the trunk circle must be kept clean - loosen the soil, remove weeds, mulch it after watering. The weeds themselves, perhaps a tree well developed even at a young age, will not cause serious inconvenience, however, the pests and diseases that live on them can spread to the pine tree, then you will have to fight the enemy already on your territory. In addition, weeds, forming the most real dense thickets, inhibit the normal evaporation of moisture from the soil surface, allow moisture to stagnate and thereby create simply ideal conditions for the development of fungal infection. Of course, when carrying out weeding in the near-trunk strip of ordinary pine, you need to be careful - a chopper or a hoe can not be dug more than a couple of centimeters, otherwise roots that are close to the soil surface of this plant can be easily damaged. After weeding the soil, you can water it and mulch it, for example, with humus - this will preserve moisture, and weed growth will slow it down.

Pine pruning

As the common pine grows and develops, it may well be pruning as well. In this case, cropping will be more corrective than formative. Pine pruning is needed in cases where, under the influence of shadow or other factors, the crown turned out to be one-sided or when individual shoots stick out ugly, breaking out of the general ideal picture (contour). In this case, it is necessary to carefully remove all shoots knocking out of the general contour with a simple secateurs, making sure that the crown again becomes symmetrical and magnificent. By the way, if pine growth slowed down, then you can pinch the very ends of young growth in May, this technique will send the nutrients of the ordinary pine to the formation of lateral shoots and inhibit the growth of the central conductor, so you can somewhat limit upward growth in the tree.

In addition, in spring, the pine tree should be carefully inspected for broken, withered branches, and if any are found, immediately remove them.

Pine preparation for winter

As soon as the first frosts come down to the soil, you can proceed to shelter the pine trees planted on the site. First of all, you need to cover the roots of a young tree, insulate its legs, for which the base of the tree must be mulched with a humus layer of 9-11 cm. Mulching, among other things, will maintain a safe temperature in the root layer and retain moisture in the soil. If you live in regions where winter winds and snow are frequent from the near-trunk strip of pine, the wind can blow, then it is advisable to lay spruce paws on top of the mulch layer, which are excellent snow retainers.

Take care of the protection against sunburn, from which the common pine trees often suffer. The risk of sunburn increases to the maximum extent in spring, when a bright sun begins to shine. To protect young plants of common pine from sunburn, it is necessary to wrap them with non-woven covering material.

Pine cultivation: reproduction

Everyone can buy a pine in a nursery, but would you be able to propagate it yourself in your garden plot? In fact, this is not so difficult, the easiest way to propagate ordinary pine is to sow seeds. In the autumn sowing of seeds on a bed with loose and nutritious soil in the spring they will sprout almost everything (up to 91%). However, despite such a large germination of seeds, there are also quite high losses of seedlings when growing seedlings. This happens most often from ignorance; so, few people know that young seedlings necessarily need shading and regular watering, so that the soil is constantly a little moist. Only in the third year a lone branch of pine seedling acquires lateral shoots and only then can it be called an independent plant.

By the way, you can grow ordinary pine seedlings at home. To do this, around the end of January, the seeds must be wrapped in a cloth and refrigerated so that the seeds are stratified there, that is, they themselves have prepared for sowing.

Around April, pine seeds can be sown in boxes with loose and nutritious turf soil, buried by about a centimeter. After sowing, the boxes should be put up on the southern windowsill and covered with a film until shoots appear. In the future, before emergence, the soil must be watered from the spray gun, and as soon as the shoots appear, the film must be removed. Choosing the option of growing ordinary pine plants at home, you need to learn that in the pot these plants will grow for two or three years and only after that they can be planted on the site. When transplanting, it is very important not to expose the root system of the seedlings, trying to transfer the seedling along with a lump of earth.

If an ordinary pine tree grows on your site, but is a decorative form obtained from it, then you need to use the vaccination method for reproduction. As a stock (the plant to be vaccinated), you need to take seedlings of common pine, about four years old. Vaccination can be carried out as a cuttings (in spring), and a kidney (in the middle of summer).

Pine Diseases and Pests

Inspect the pine for various damage to both the bark and needles, for example, to change their color, it is often necessary, this may indicate the onset of some kind of disease.

Pine pests

Of pine pests, fir-fir hermes is considered the most dangerous, its activity leads to the fact that the needles turn yellow. The colonies of this pest are similar to snow-white cotton wool, which covers the needles. To overcome the pest, it is necessary at the first signs of its appearance to treat the plant with insecticides.

Spruce ordinary sawfly - this pest eats pine needles with pleasure.In this case, the needles become red, as if it had been burned. If there is a lot of pest, then young shoots can completely remain without needles. To combat this pest, you can use Fufanon or other insecticides, strictly following the instructions for use.

The bark beetle is a small bug that reaches a length of 0.5 cm. A bug in the ordinary pine wood literally gnaws at the passages and lays eggs in these passages, from which whole colonies of the same individuals subsequently appear. It’s scary to think, but even an adult bark beetle tree can be completely destroyed in 45-50 days. If you notice holes in the wood of ordinary pine, then insecticides may not help, in addition to treating the surface of the tree with an insecticide, you also need to inject this drug into the holes. Processing can be carried out weekly until the complete extermination of insects.

Pine disease

Schütte ordinary, - this disease belongs to the category of fungal diseases. With it, at first, brown spots are formed on the needles, so small that they can not be immediately noticed. Over time, the spots increase, grow, turn yellow, and then acquire a brown color, and the needles at this stage of the disease progression begin to fall. Under the fallen needles on the branches of common pine, you can see mycelium, they have the appearance of dark formations of very different shapes. In order to overcome this disease, it is necessary to treat plants with colloidal sulfur (a tablespoon in a bucket of water, the norm for 2-3 plants) or a 1% Bordeaux liquid in the autumn season.

And, of course, rust - this is the most common disease of ordinary pine. With this disease on the shoots you can see orange spots and swellings that spread quite quickly throughout the plant and can spread to neighboring, still healthy pine trees. If the infection is already strong enough, then there is nothing left but to cut the affected branches and burn them, and if the whole plant is affected, then uproot it and also burn it. So you will not allow the further spread of the disease. Of the control measures, treatments with colloidal sulfur and Bordeaux fluid can be used, as described above.

So, as you understand: ordinary pine can become your reliable friend throughout life, it will decorate the site and give shade and fresh air, without saddening you with falling leaves and not forcing it to clean. With proper care, the pine will remain young and beautiful for centuries, and not only you, but also your children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren will be pleased with it.