Home care for ficus Belize
A small plant brought from exotic countries will help to decorate a house or apartment, to revive a boring interior. Few people know, but Ficus Belize owes its origin to distant Africa and countries with a hot climate and sandy soil.
Home care for ficus Belize
Planting a Belize Ficus sprout is not difficult, and a perennial crop will not require a lot of time from a person to care for and money to fertilize. How to care for Ficus?
Description
Ficus Belize is difficult to confuse with similar green plants growing on the south side of a residential building. The dense, dark green leaves, which contain poisonous sap, love sunlight and warmth. Ficus stems and shoots look extraordinarily juicy. The beautiful overflow of shades, the unusual shape of the foliage and the elongated stem make the Belize variety not only colorful, but also memorable.
Ficus foliage color is always heterogeneous. Green, light green, pale colors, smoothly turning into the stem in the warm season, crowned with small bright inflorescences.
The Belize variety loves not only high temperatures, but also free space. When breeding at home, he needs to organize special conditions for rapid growth, to provide constant nourishment, thanks to which the foliage will grow. The culture that grows in the wilderness of African countries needs sun and regular watering. Water and fertilizers, which feed the root system of the variety through the soil, undergo additional preparation. An unpretentious variety needs special care.
Ficus can withstand unfavorable environmental conditions for several weeks, and only a long stay in the cold or in constant shade leads to its death.
Belize belongs to the euphorbia family, which grows in hot countries and does not tolerate too low temperatures. It will be possible to grow a culture in any region if you provide juicy leaves, stem and root system with constant nutrition and a little warmth.
Care
In some beginners, the ficuses stretch upward, and the purple stem becomes thinner. This phenomenon indicates improper care of an exotic culture.
Caring for Belize ficus does not take much time. The stalk, planted in the warm season, is quickly accepted and allowed to grow.
Belize is planted closer to spring, and in the fall the first inflorescences appear on it. It is important to calculate planting times and schedule consistent watering. In winter, only the soil requires moisture, it should not dry out.
Ficus content includes a number of simple activities:
- regular watering;
- fertilization of the soil and root system (the fertilizer is covered 1 cm above the ground level);
- airing the room;
- organization of correct lighting and temperature conditions;
- air humidification.
The optimum ambient temperature is between 20 ° C and 25 ° C. In winter, the minimum temperature is 16 ° C. The lower the air temperature, the slower the stem grows. The slowdown in growth allows the ficus to survive adverse environmental conditions.
In summer, the plant can be taken out to the balcony, but it is important to protect the foliage from drafts: frequent temperature changes make the culture weak and sluggish. It will be more difficult to restore nutrition to the root system if the soil is dry. With the arrival of autumn, watering must be reduced.
Lighting and humidity
Before planting a ficus, it is worth making sure that the home has all the necessary conditions for the plant to grow properly.
The optimal place for planting a culture is a windowsill in the southern part of the room. Avoid direct sunlight, which causes burns on the foliage of the flower. If there is no other place in the apartment or house, you can make a small shelter for the pot.
Protect the plant from direct sunlight
The more warmth in the room, the brighter the color and overflow of the color of the variety will be. Bright light helps a culture to grow rapidly. The southeast side of the room can also become a permanent residence for the ficus tree. In the summer, you can water the flowerpot literally every day. In the spring, the soil is fertilized with water at least once every 3 days. The soil in the pot should always be soft and saturated with moisture. Only under such conditions does Belize manage to grow not only quickly, but also correctly.
In winter, watering is reduced to 2 times a month. This procedure allows you to keep the soil until spring. It is necessary to take care of its saturation especially carefully, and immediately drain excess moisture. High air humidity will protect the skin of the plant from severe drying out. To increase the humidity, it is advisable to spray the air every 2 weeks.
Landing
The substance for disembarkation is prepared in advance; a neutral acidic environment must be provided in it. If you plant a crop in ordinary soil, it will soon dry out. Before planting the root system (the rhizome is shaken off the soil from the transport pot), the prepared and enriched soil is loosened. To prepare the soil with your own hands, you will need to mix sod and leafy soil in equal proportions. Sand is used to dilute the soil.
Favorable environment for the rapid growth of the cuttings:
- sod soil;
- leafy land;
- peat soil;
- sand.
Homemade soil can be additionally fertilized and watered. A special drainage layer is lined on the bottom of the pot, which allows the water for irrigation not to stagnate near the rhizome. In such conditions, the ficus will be able to grow, and the green leaves will look fresh all year round. Excessive shade will only harm the plant, which should not be placed in direct sunlight; it is also not recommended to hide the culture. Green Ficus may dry out, which indicates improper care.
Top dressing of the soil is needed only in the warm season: in spring and autumn. For replenishment, you should use mineral fertilizers and organic mixtures that are diluted with water. The main purpose of fertilization is to increase the nitrogen level in the soil. In winter, you need to wait a little with feeding, because the growth of the ficus slows down significantly.
Pruning of the plant occurs from the second year of the variety's life. Too elongated shoots are carefully pruned. This is done at the end of spring, before the start of active growth. Dry foliage or damaged parts of the crop should also be trimmed so that the stem does not lose excess juices.
Transplant and watering
Choosing a pot for planting is a simple matter, but it also requires knowledge about the characteristics of the growth of a culture. The height of the planting container is equal to one third of the height of the whole plant. It is better not to take the pot without a drainage hole, otherwise the drainage of excess water will become a big problem. The material from which the pot is made must have a porous structure. Ceramic is suitable for planting Ficus of any size.
The bottom of the container must be covered with a drainage layer. Pebbles and small pebbles will allow water to pass through the drainage hole without harm to the root system. Expanded clay is also suitable for drainage.For additional protection of the rhizome, a layer of fine-grained sand is covered over the pebbles, then the soil is poured and carefully compacted around the root system. For a tall plant, a solid support is installed during planting, with which the ficus is not threatened with destruction. The first watering occurs on the second day after planting, when the rhizome is compacted.
Conclusion
Young Ficus belize are transplanted annually.
This procedure helps to improve the growth of the culture and additionally nourish the rhizome. A mature crop should be transplanted into a new larger pot every 3 years. The root system of ficus grows rapidly with proper care, it becomes cramped in a small container. Too large pots can also harm the plant - young ficus will lose moisture and juice. Old crops are not transplanted at all, their root system practically does not grow, and unnecessary manipulations only harm the stem. Only the top layer of the soil is replaced, all the soil is well fertilized.
The purchased ficus is allowed to settle (up to two weeks) before being transplanted into a new pot. The acclimatization period takes on average 10 days, after which nothing prevents the plant from equipping in a new place. It will become a real decoration of your home flower garden.