This is one of those plants that captivated the hearts of gardeners not with their flowers, but with bright and amazing foliage. It is also called a room or home nettle. Particularly beautiful are plantings along the tracks , in pots, and compositions in the rustic style. Most often, for growing a koleus in the garden, use a seedling method or cuttings. Both of them quite justify themselves, and each gardener is free to choose his method.
Growing of wheels with seedlings
If you live in a house and seedlings for you the constant state of the windowsills, then a couple more boxes with the seeds of the wheel exactly will not interfere. Quite enough standard soil for seedlings. After sowing seeds, just sand them a little and moisten them. As a rule, sow begin in the middle-end of March, it all depends on your region.
Almost all kinds of koleus can boast of high germination of seeds, so that in about a week or a year and a half you will see that friendly shoots have grown under the glass. After that, the glass can already be removed and put the boxes in a bright place without direct sunlight. As for many other plant species, a temperature of 20 ° C is considered acceptable for the wheel.
For successful planting of the wheel, it is important to ensure the plant a good growth of roots, and then care in the open ground will be simple. To do this, in the fourth week we will transplant all the seedlings into cassettes, but not before the first pair of these leaves appear. And already in the sixth week you can dive into glasses. Do not forget to pinch the tops. With the onset of warm weather, you can transfer the seedlings to their permanent place.
Planting by the method of cuttings and care for the wheel in the open ground
Many believe that most species of koleus should be grown only by cuttings. This is done to preserve varietal and specific features. Cuttings get
After cutting, the lower leaves should be removed and the workpieces planted in one pot. The length of the cut is about 10 cm, it is desirable to find specimens with several internodes. At the bottom of the pot drain is laid, then the soil is planted for seedlings. For further cultivation, the wheels are covered with a plastic bottle and sent to a window with good lighting and a cool temperature of no higher than 15 ° C.
Further after landing the wheel you will see the appearance of the first shoots, and this will be the beginning of the second stage of care - you need to remove the bottle. In spring, the planting is cut almost to the root to get more lush bushes. Cut off parts are quite useful for rooting and obtaining additional planting material.