Perhaps, not a single garden plot is complete without currants. This fragrant and healthy berry is very popular. Currant bushes are decorated with clusters of various colors: white, red, pink, black. And what a fragrant tea with currant leaf! To grow productive bushes, you need to plant them correctly.
Selection of seedlings
Planting material is best purchased in nurseries, where plants undergo strict control. When buying seedlings, you need to carefully inspect the roots. The largest of them in the amount of two or three should be brownish-yellow in color and 15-20 cm long. In addition to them, there should be light thin roots, white in section.
A dirty brown color is a sign of a disease of the root system.
It is necessary to examine the earthen lump, even taking it out of the pot. If it is densely braided by roots, this is a good sign.
The root system of a healthy seedling should be developed, fibrous, without mold
Do not take plants with flexible unripe shoots - they can freeze in the winter. A quality shoot is completely brown, with leaves and buds without spots and signs of wilting.
When buying seedlings on the market, you need to pay attention to the shape and size of the buds: the presence of round and swollen indicates the defeat of the plant by a kidney tick. Sick twigs need to be cut and burned.
Currant planting time
When planted in the fall, the currant adapts well and begins to grow immediately in the spring. In the suburbs, September is considered the best month for planting; in the southern regions, October. The plant takes root well in two weeks. To preserve moisture and protect the roots from freezing, mulch the soil around the seedling with natural materials:
- foliage;
- compost;
- rotted manure.
In the spring, it is difficult to choose a favorable moment, since the buds begin to bloom very early on the currant and need to be planted before this time. In the suburbs, the optimal period is the beginning of May. With a later planting, the plants will not take root well and lag behind in development.
It is better to navigate not by calendar dates, but by the state of the kidneys. They should be swollen, but not opened at the time of landing.
In regions with snowy winters, currants are best planted in spring.
Site selection and landing features
Like most plants, currants love well-lit areas. In the shaded area, the shrub will grow, but the stems will stretch and yield will drop. In the shade, the berry is more affected by fungal diseases.
In addition to good illumination, currants are demanding of high soil moisture. Loamy soils with good drainage are ideal for it.
Currants develop well in sunny areas with sufficient moisture.
Landing pattern
The distance between the seedlings in the row should be at least 1 m, and between the rows leave up to 2 m. This is a standard landing pattern. From the berry to fruit trees - at least 2.5 m.
When choosing the density of placement, you need to consider the type of crown of the selected variety and other factors. If the bushes are supposed to be used no more than two years, you can tighten the planting scheme, reducing the distance between plants to 70 cm.
Soil preparation and planting seedlings
20-30 days before planting, prepare the soil. The site is cleaned of weeds and dug to a depth of 22-25 cm with the addition of fertilizers. On 1 m2 contribute:
- 3-4 kg of humus or compost;
- 100-150 g of double superphosphate;
- 20-30 g of potassium sulfate;
- 0.3-0.5 kg of lime per m2 (if the soil is acidic).
The landing process consists of the following:
- Dig a hole or trench with a depth of 35-40 cm and a width of 50-60 cm, folding separately the upper fertile soil layer.
In the process of digging a planting pit, you need to set aside the upper fertile soil layer
- Make a nutrient mixture:
- a bucket of humus;
- 2 tbsp. tablespoons of superphosphate;
- 2 tbsp. tablespoons of potassium salt or 2 cups of wood ash;
- fertile soil.
- Fill the hole 2/3, forming the soil with a knoll.
- Put a seedling in the pit with a deepening of the root neck of 5-7 cm and a slope at an angle of 45 degrees. A few kidneys should remain underground after backfilling.
Oblique landing stimulates the appearance of additional roots and shoots from the kidneys of the buried part of the stem and root neck
- Cover the seedling with earth, carefully spreading the roots on an earthen mound and pouring water.
- To compact the soil around the seedling and once again it is good to pour a bucket of water.
- Mulch the soil around the seedling.
- Immediately after planting, it is necessary to cut off the aerial shoots, leaving no more than two buds on each so that the seedling can take root well and give new productive branches. As a result, a powerful healthy bush with many young shoots develops.
Video: how to choose and plant currants
Currant propagation methods
With a decrease in the yield of berry plantings, they should be updated. There are several ways to reproduce:
- cuttings;
- layering;
- dividing the bush.
Cuttings
A popular method of propagation of currants is cuttings due to the possibility of obtaining a large amount of planting material.
When spring planting, you must:
- Cut annual shoots with a diameter of at least a regular pencil (about 5-6 mm).
- Cut from the middle part of the cuttings with a length of 15-20 cm at a distance of 1 cm from the upper and lower kidneys. The upper cut is done directly, and the lower diagonally. The shank should have at least 4-5 kidneys.
- Dig a planting bed to a depth of 20 cm.
- To make the row even, put the pegs and pull a rope on them.
- Stick the cuttings into loose earth with a slope of 45 degrees after 15 cm, leaving 2 buds on top, and deepen the rest.
Cuttings 15-20 cm long are planted at an angle of 45 degrees at a distance of 15 cm from each other
- Lay agrofilm along a row to retain heat and moisture, to prevent the growth of weeds.
- Plant the next row at a distance of 40 cm.
- When the soil warms up well, remove the film.
Video: spring planting of currants with cuttings
When harvesting cuttings in the fall you need:
- Dip them into the water with the lower end and incubate for a week at a temperature of 20 degrees. Change the water twice. Such cuttings can be planted immediately in the open ground, they will take root well.
- Plant in the same way as in spring, in an inclined position a little deeper, with one bud on the surface.
- Water the soil well and mulch with a layer of up to 5 cm. As a mulch, use:
- peat;
- humus;
- straw;
- You can lay a dark or transparent film instead of mulch.
Cuttings planted in the fall will produce roots in early spring and begin to grow before the buds open. Seedlings received in a year should be moved to a permanent place.
You can plant the cuttings in the fall in a container with soil and drainage holes (glasses or bottles made of plastic), put on the windowsill of the house and water until spring. Flowers and ovaries must be removed.
Video: autumn planting of currants with cuttings
Layering
The most common method is propagation by horizontal layering.
- They bend a two-year-old branch to the ground, loosened and watered, and pin it with wire.
- After the emergence of shoots in this place, they fall asleep with soil 2 times:
- With shoot height 10-12 cm.
- 2-3 weeks after that.
- When the layers are completely rooted, they are dug up and planted.
When currants are propagated by horizontal layering, the shoot is laid in a groove, pinned to the soil and covered with soil
For vertical layers, young bushes are used.
- Most of the branches are cut almost to the ground, this stimulates the growth of shoots from the lower buds.
- At a height of new stems of 20 cm or more they are spudded to half with moist earth, after preliminary loosening the soil around the bush.
- In autumn, shoots with roots are cut and planted separately.
When currants are propagated by vertical layering, the branches are cut to obtain new shoots
Dividing the bush
Reproduction of currants by dividing the bush is carried out in the fall after falling of leaves (in October - November) or in early spring before buds open (in March).
- Dig the plant carefully out of the ground. To preserve the roots as much as possible, you need to dig in at a distance of 40 cm from the center of the bush.
- Free the roots from the soil.
- Secateurs or saws divide the bush into several equal parts, preferably no more than three.
- Before planting, remove old, broken, diseased and poorly developing shoots. For better survival of plants, place them for a day in water with the addition of growth stimulants.
- Plant in the same way as seedlings.
The division of the bushes can be used when moving the plantation to a new place.
This method of reproduction is not the best, despite its lightness and speed. In an old plant, diseases and pests accumulate that can develop on a transplanted bush.
Video: reproduction of currants by dividing the bush
Change to a new place
Adult bushes not older than 10 years can be moved to another, more convenient place or to another site. A transplant of an adult bush is carried out in the autumn, after the end of fruiting. At this time, it does not need to be watered, as in spring, it will take root better.
It is necessary to wait until the sap flow is over so that the bush does not start to grow immediately and does not freeze in winter, that is, two weeks before frosts. In the middle lane it is September - October, in the southern regions - October - early November.
The hole is prepared in advance: they put drainage, humus, mineral fertilizers. Its size depends on the root system of the transplanted plant, usually a hole 70x70x70 cm is enough.
- Prepare the plant for transplantation: clean from dried and old branches, cut the young stems in half.
- Dig a bush on all sides at a distance of 40 cm from the center so as not to damage the roots, then remove along with a lump of earth.
- Inspect the roots, remove damaged ones, as well as pest larvae, if any.
- Put the bush "in the mud." To do this, pour water into the prepared hole until a liquid soil mixture is formed and place the plant in it.
- Top with dry earth and water again abundantly.
Currants are very tenacious, well take root in any soil, not even fertilized.
Video: currant transplant (part 1)
Video: currant transplant (part 2)
Post-transplant care consists of the following actions:
- Currants need abundant watering for 1-2 weeks, but no more than three, so that the roots do not rot and fungal diseases do not appear.
- When replanting young plants, it is necessary to break off the color at first, so that the plant takes root and develops well, and does not waste strength on bearing fruit.
- If there is a threat of frost, the bush needs to be covered.
As you can see, it is not difficult to grow currants. To begin with, you can take a sprout with a root from a neighbor and plant one bush. In two years, it will already grow well and produce a crop. The main thing is to start!
