Uncinia - Copper Container Grain

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Among the decorative cereals, one can meet both popular fashionistas and rare handsome men who claim to be the pride of the garden. Of the latter, of course, belongs to oziniya - a low-winter species of ornamental herbs, which is mainly grown as a container plant. But the unique palette of gold and copper, which manifests itself in sods, and the striking texture of this cereal are still worth the small difficulties associated with carrying for the winter. Oucinia is one of the most moving red herbs imaginable.

Uncynia - the compact red cereal queen is not for everyone

The name of the ozinii is so consonant with the ursinia-clinovics, fashionable today, that by ear this rare cereal seems to be almost their relative. But ounces are full-fledged representatives of magnificent decorative cereals. And although they also cannot boast of winter hardiness, they have nothing to do with the pilots.

Uncinia (Uncinia) is a fairly large genus of ornamental perennial herbs, including about fifty species of cereals. But our ounceia are practically unknown, and the area of not only their growth in nature, but also distribution in landscape design is practically limited to the southern hemisphere. To the north of the equator, the beauty of the ounce is only beginning to be revealed, and in the southern regions and countries with a mild climate, it is already on the same line with fashionable hakonehloa and sedge.

Ounceias are predominantly Australian and New Zealand herbs, only some species grow in Southeast Asia, South and Central America. At home, these plants are known as hook grass and bastard grass.

Unzinii are herbs that in the wild are able to form stunning thickets of beauty and most often live in humid places. Damp forests, swampy meadows - this is their natural environment.

Unzini are dense, perennial herbs that produce a very thick clump of root leaves. The unique evergreen cereal, all colors of which are preserved even under the snow, does not reveal all its beauty immediately. The height of the ounce is limited to 10-70 cm, most often it is compact plants 35-50 cm tall with the same diameter of the turf. Long, linear leaves in the game of textures can compete with fescue, but they are not twisted and narrow, but flat, with a width of 4 to 7 mm.

The color of the leaves of ozinia is golden brown, with different light or dark variations of orange-red tides, young leaves are less expressive than old ones. The leaves of this cereal are as if covered with a dusting of metals, which only emphasizes their roughness; they glisten in a special way in the sun and their textures and are truly associated with precious metals. For the beauty of the colors of ounce, they earned the title of copper or bronze herbs.

This cereal blooms in May or June. Ozinia inflorescences are airy and elegant. The apical spikelets carry female and male flowers, flaunting with an unusual spikelet axis, bent at the top like a hook (in fact, this is a wrapped opaque scales with a very rigid structure, in the bosom of which an underdeveloped kidney is hidden).

Thanks to the “claw”, ounce is effectively distributed in nature, easily catching on wool and feathers. At the top of the inflorescence are male flowers. In the lower part are bags that hide female flowers. The fruits are also hidden in pouches, trihedral, small.

Types of Ounces

Of all the species of ounces, only two species are mainly used as ornamental plants:

Hooked Ounceia (Uncinia uncinata). This is an evergreen species about half a meter high with a slightly smaller diameter, hard straight peduncles that are almost invisible against the background of rough, brown, flat leaves. The flowers in narrowed spikelets are distinguished by a very dark brown-copper color. Inflorescences grow up to 60 cm in length.
The most favorite plant is red ounce, which is sometimes indicated in the catalogs as the н Red ’hooked ounce, although according to all botanical classifications it is an independent species - Uncinia rubra. This is a magnificent plant that makes bronze-red, shining, luxuriously metallic foliage special. It is considered the only completely red cereal. There are separate varieties on sale, for example, the luxurious ‘Everflame’ and ‘Firedans’ - varieties with dazzling red glossy leaves and the declared 5th frost resistance zone, which theoretically can be grown in open ground (plant height is only 35-40 cm).

Much less popular, although very beautiful, are other types of ounces:

Related Uncinia (Uncinia affinis) - yellowish-golden, densely perennial perennial from 10 to 80 cm tall with narrow greenish leaves and denser spikelets of inflorescences;
Uncinia Egmont (Uncinia egmontiana) is a compact, 25-30-centimeter-long species that develops in the form of tufts with very tough, bronze-raspberry curved leaves and unusual bronze spikelets in which black seeds are then tied.

In the design of a garden, oysters are used:

as a major container accent for decorating terraces, recreation areas, at the entrance, gates, on walkways, along buildings;
as a dug container for quickly masking voids in decorative compositions;
for large prefabricated compositions in containers and balcony drawers;
for potted compositions of the autumn garden;
in portable "mobile" flower beds;
in ordinary borders and borders from the same containers placed in a row;
for decorating stone flower girls, flowerpots on socles and "legs";
as a masker of voids and bald spots;
for small bright, textural accents and copper spots on flower beds and in mixborders;
for playing with metal textures in modern gardens and landscape plantings;
for planting in the foreground as a framing culture, etc.

Growing oz.

Strategies for growing ounces in the middle lane:

as a fully container plant;
container cereal with digging into the soil;
planting in open soil with excavation and carrying in containers for the winter.

Conditions required by ounces

This is one of the most sun-loving cereals. Regardless of whether the oyster is grown in soil or in a container, it is necessary to expose it only in sunny places, so that the plant enjoys the full sun every laziness. Unziniya will not refuse even the hot southern locations.

The soil for this plant is selected from among light, loose, loose, but moist. Unziniya develops well and reaches a bright color only in nutrient soil. When planting in open soil, it can be placed near water bodies. When planting in containers, you can use a universal substrate for potted and potted crops. In whatever form the plant is grown, it is very important for an ounce to lay a high layer of drainage at the bottom of the tank or planting pits. Ounceia do not tolerate acidic soils, stagnation of water, compacted soil. Loosening additives in the soil (vermiculite, sand, perlite, expanded clay) are only welcome.

Ounce care

Regular watering is the main and only measure of care for this cereal. When grown in ounce pots, they maintain a light, stable soil moisture, avoiding overflows, allowing the substrate to dry in the upper and middle layer between treatments. Drought is not afraid of cereals. But in combination with hot temperatures, they can lead to partial drying of the leaves of ounce and a significant blanching of colors.

When growing in open soil, it is also advisable to carry out maintenance irrigation for long periods of drought, since the plant is quite hygroscopic. Light stable moisture allows the cereal to reveal its beauty. But in the absence of watering, ounce will be modest in size, and in splendor, and in palette.

Plant nutrition is applied only when grown in containers, using any universal liquid fertilizer and applying them with a frequency of 1 time in 2-3 weeks. When planting unzinia in open soil, it is enough to make sure that the soil is fertile and improve it when planting with the addition of mineral and organic fertilizers.

Pruning and other care measures for ounces are not needed, but if it overwinters in warm rooms, then in the spring after winter the sods of old leaves are cut, stimulating renewal and compensating for the absence of a resting phase. The plant in containers and container compositions can be periodically "cleaned", remove dry or damaged leaves to maintain the beauty of the turf.

The plant is resistant to pests and diseases.

Ounce rejuvenation

This cereal independently signals the need for separation of curtains, the need for rejuvenation. As soon as the ozinia loses its characteristic reddish color, the leaf sods become dull and pale, it is necessary to plan for the next spring separation. Curtains of the plant are divided into 2-3 large delenki, removing dead parts, and each planted as an independent plant. When planting ounces, it is important to maintain the level of turf deepening the same, not to raise it above the soil level, but not to cover the base of the leaves with earth.

Ozincia wintering

When buying ounces, the possibility of growing in open soil and the need for shelter is best specified. Individual varieties adapted at local garden centers may show higher frost resistance than the base plant. Perhaps they winter well even in the middle lane when sheltering. But since the overwhelming majority of ounces on the market are Dutch seedlings, it is worth considering them to be standardly non-resistant.

The maximum frost resistance, which is inherent in the well-known varieties of unziniums, is zone 7a, which is equal to the ability to withstand 15-18 degrees of frost. In most plants, the declared winter hardiness is much less - from 8 to 12 zones. Low endurance leaves few opportunities for growing this interesting cereal in the middle lane. The most reliable way is container culture.

If you want to conduct an experiment, you can try to keep ounce in curbs or decorative plantings with full shelter for the winter - high hilling with dry leaves, wrapping non-woven materials and spruce branches. But it’s much easier to dig out ounces and transfer them to the pots before winter.

The classic wintering strategy of ounce:

after the first frosts, the containers with the plant are additionally insulated with non-woven materials, placed on a stand or in a drawer, basket, tub, filling the piers with dry leaves or sawdust (ozniya is not afraid of any cooling, it can remain in the garden as decoration until night -10 when warming containers);
with the advent of the first stable nocturnal frosts, the plant is placed in the buffer zone for complete drying of the sod and adaptation to new conditions;
after 3-7 days, the containers are transferred to bright rooms.

Lighting is very important for an ounce, but what will be the temperature regime - cold (from 3 to 5 degrees, like most frames), cool room (12-15 degrees), equal to the conditions of a standard greenhouse, loggia, winter garden and half-warm greenhouse - not so important. In winter, with ounces you can decorate the interior of residential premises. In the latter case, ounce will have to be more actively looked after and watered more often, but there is nothing particularly complicated.

In the southern regions, ounce can be used as an open ground culture; it does not need preparation for winter with mild winters. Cutting sods for the winter is not worth it: red ounce is inimitably good in the winter garden and revitalizes any boring landscape, preserving all its beauty and under the snow.

Ounceia breeding methods

Separation of bushes in the spring (as with rejuvenation).
The seeds. They are planted according to the standard technology of growing pilots through seedlings, sowing in flat containers in early spring, slightly covering with a substrate and germinating under the film and warm. Dive - after the appearance of the third true leaf. Young shoots develop rapidly. In the first year, it is better to grow as a container culture, even in the south.