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Barberry Orange Rocket (Berberis thunbergii Orange Rocket) is a striking representative of the barberry family. The uniqueness of this variety lies in the color of the foliage and shoots. Young plants have bright orange foliage that turns dark red as they grow. Landscape designers are happy to use it when drawing up plant compositions, decorating park and garden spaces.
Description of barberry Orange Rocket
Barberry Orange Rocket naturally lives in the mountains of Tibet and on the gentle slopes of China. In Russia, barberry appeared in the middle of the 19th century. For its decorative properties, it has earned recognition from Russian gardeners. The color of new shoots is yellow-orange with a pink tint.
Barberry Thunberg Orange Rocket is a deciduous shrub that grows rather slowly. Shoots are vertical, resilient, with thorns.
The shape of the crown resembles a column up to 1.0-1.2 m high and 0.4 m wide.
Leaves are of medium size, smooth, oval in shape. The color of the leaves changes with the growth of the plant: starting with green, continuing with yellowish and orange flowers, burgundy shades appear in the fall.
The flowers are small, yellow with a reddish tinge, collected in small inflorescences. Flowering should be expected in late May or early June.
Elliptical red fruits appear in late August or early September. For humans, they are inedible, but they are perfectly eaten by birds.
The root system is branched. Barberry Orange Rocket is undemanding to soil fertility. In addition, photophilous, frost-hardy, grows well in urban conditions.
A variety of barberry Rosie Rocket
Barberry Rosie Rocket is a new decorative form. Shoots grow vertically up to 1.3 m in height and up to 0.6 m in width. The bark of young shoots has a red tint, and lignified shoots are usually brown.
Oval leaves, which change their color from red in spring to burgundy with white-pink streaks in summer, are colored orange in autumn.
Rosie Rocket blooms in late spring with pale yellow flowers, collected in small inflorescences.
Red berry fruits ripen in early September and decorate the shrub throughout the winter. The fruits are unsuitable for food.
Due to its well-developed root system, barberry is used to strengthen ravines, slopes and banks.
Rosie Rocket is used for the preparation of group and mixed plantings, for planting in curbs, for creating hedges. Well tolerates sanitary and anti-aging pruning.
In cold regions, Rosie Rocket barberry throws off the foliage during the cold season, and in the southern regions the leaves remain on the bushes.
Barberry Orange Rocket in landscape design
Landscape designers and hobby gardeners use the Orange Rocket extensively as:
- solitary landings;
- hedges;
- accent in alpine slides, rockeries;
- edging for flower beds and plant, shrub groups;
- borders;
- companions of conifers and herbaceous plants;
The variety should not be planted in close proximity to cherries, acacia, elderberry and hazel. The root system and falling foliage of these trees slow down the development of the barberry.
The strong aroma during flowering of Orange Rocket attracts annoying insects, so it is not planted next to a residential building.
Planting and caring for barberry Orange Rocket
The unpretentiousness of growing is a huge plus of the Orange Rocket barberry.The variety loves sunny, open places, but grows well in partial shade. In bushes growing in the shade, the foliage becomes green.
Orange Rocket can grow on drained soils of any acidity. It tolerates heat and lack of watering well.
Seedling and planting plot preparation
A site for planting barberry should be chosen with good illumination. If a group planting of plants of different heights is planned, the placement of seedlings in relation to the sun should be taken into account. Closer to the sunny side, low-growing crops are planted, then medium-sized ones and at the very end - tall and large ones. This placement will maximize the access of the sun to the plants.
In order for the plant to develop harmoniously, it is necessary to prepare the soil. Orange Rocket grows well on loose, moist, sandy loam and loamy soils. The main thing is that the acidity of the soil is from slightly acidic to slightly alkaline. Acidic soil needs to be limed. To do this, before planting barberry, slaked lime is introduced into the planting hole. In addition to lime, you can add humus, wood ash and superphosphate in the proportion:
- 400 g of slaked lime or 500 g of dolomite flour;
- from 8 to 10 kg of humus;
- 200 g of ash;
- 100 g superphosphate.
It is convenient to use Orange Rocket barberry seedlings with a closed root system for planting. Such a plant can be planted at any time during the growing season. A plant with an open root system takes root better in the spring, before the buds begin to spill out. If the seedling is in the active growing season, then it should be transplanted into open ground in the fall.
Landing rules
2-3 weeks before planting, it is necessary to prepare the holes for the seedlings. If you plant a hedge, it is more convenient to dig a trench. A layer of sand is poured at the bottom of the trench or holes to improve air access to the roots. For single plantings, each bush is planted at a distance of 0.5 m. The depth of the holes should be at least 20-40 cm. The seedling is placed in the hole, sprinkled with nutritious soil, compacted by hand and watered abundantly. Then the trunk circle is mulched with compost or peat. From above, the seedling is cut to 1/3 of the length.
Watering and feeding
In the first days after planting in the ground, the barberry is watered 2 times a week, not forgetting about the inadmissibility of an excess of moisture. Do not moisten the ground during the rainy season. In the dry season, watering is carried out weekly. The water should be warm, watering is carried out at the root, without getting water on the leaves.
Organic fertilizing is applied under the grown bush, namely chicken droppings, compost, infusion of weeds, urea. 2-3 additional dressings are needed per season. In the spring, sodium is used to fertilize the soil, in the summer - phosphates, and in the fall - potassium.
Loosening and weeding of the trunk circle is well reflected on the growth of the shrub.
Pruning
Barberry care is not complete without timely pruning. Sanitary pruning is necessary in early spring before sap flow begins. With its help, the bush is freed from damaged shoots. The first formative pruning is carried out one year after planting, in the spring. The branches are cut in half to enhance tillering. The following pruning procedures are carried out 2-3 times a year, in the middle of summer.
Preparing for winter
Barberry Thunberg Orange Rocket is winter-hardy, but in severe winters freezing of annual shoots is possible. To avoid this, at the time of frost, young shoots are covered with burlap. In addition, gardeners recommend mulching the trunk circle with spruce branches, leaf litter or peat for the winter. For good frost tolerance, superphosphate-based top dressing is applied in the fall.
Reproduction
You can propagate barberry in the following ways:
- cuttings;
- grain;
- dividing the bush;
- layering.
The most effective way is propagation by layering. In this way, you can get full-fledged seedlings with a developed root system. At the same time, varietal characteristics are preserved.
Fully ripe berries are suitable for seed propagation. Barberry variety Orange Rocket bears fruit only in case of cross-pollination.When planting in the fall, it is permissible not to clean the grains of pulp, they are immediately planted in open ground on a seedling bed, deepening them by 1 cm. The distance between the grains is maintained at least 3 cm. The seedling grows in the garden for several years, then it is transplanted to a permanent place.
When sowing seeds in spring, stratification is required for up to 6 months at a temperature of 0-4 ° C. Seed germination rate is about 100%.
Diseases and pests
The barberry aphid inflicts great damage on the Thunberg Orange Rocket barberry, which affects foliage and young shoots. An effective means of combating it is a solution based on green soap (300 g / 10 l of water) or an infusion of tobacco dust (0.5 kg / 10 l of boiling water / 200 g of green soap).
The flower moth destroys the fruit. For the fight, treatment with decis according to the instructions is effective.
Powdery mildew, covering leaves, shoots and berries with white powdery spots, gradually kills the plant. It is necessary to fight the disease with sulfur-containing preparations, such as colloidal sulfur, sulfur-lime mixture, the first time - at the stage of leaf blooming, then every 15-20 days.
Severely affected stems and leaves are cut and burned.
Leaf spots appear on leaves with spots of various shapes and colors. The leaves dry up and fall off. Shoots do not ripen, which leads to freezing in winter. They are treated with copper preparations before and after flowering.
The wilting of the barberry begins with the wilting of the leaves and the drying of the shoots, first on parts of the plant, gradually spreading to the entire bush. You can suspend the infection by trimming the affected shoots.
The plant can be attacked by insect pests:
- barberry sawfly - destroys the green mass of the culture;
- flower moth - destroys fruits;
- barberry aphid - destroys leaves, young shoots.
The sawfly and the moth are fought with a 3% chlorophos solution. Aphids are disposed of by using a soap solution.
Reviews about barberry Orange Rocket
Conclusion
Barberry Orange Rocket is actively used to create attractive landscape design even in risky farming regions. In order for the planting of barberry to please the owner for a long time, it is necessary to carry out the pruning procedure on time and not neglect the prevention of diseases. Barberry shrubs are unpretentious and decorative.
