The most common are three types of honeysuckle: Kamchatka, edible, Turchaninova. Now many new varieties are bred. You can call them one species - edible honeysuckle. Although honeysuckle as a food plant has been known for a long time, but only relatively recently (the last 10-15 years) amateurs-gardeners became interested in it. But this is a wonderful berry vitamin culture with a lot of useful properties! Edible honeysuckle, planting and care, its cultivation have some features, but even a beginner gardener will master them.
Honeysuckle is an extremely early plant. Its berries ripen much earlier than strawberries. In addition, it is winter hardy - it grows even in the North. Therefore, the question of the correct landing of honeysuckle is of concern to many.
Honeysuckle - useful properties and contraindications
And what a complex of vitamins it is! Fruits contain up to 11% sugar. 100 g of fruits contain up to 50 mg of vitamin C, up to 3.8 mg - B2up to 9.2 mg - B9, up to 1000 mg - P, not counting the rich complex of organic acids, pectin substances. Berries contain a lot of iodine, manganese, iron, copper.
Honeysuckle berries contain inositol, betaine is a biologically active substance, stimulants of fat metabolism. The fruits contain triterpenic acids, a considerable amount of potassium, magnesium, sodium. It is known that triterpene acids are part of triterpene glycosides - and these are the main components of ginseng. By the way, honeysuckle berries contain more potassium than cranberries.
In addition, the optimal combination of P-active substances, vitamin C helps restore the elasticity of blood vessels, their permeability, normalize lymph flow, and reduce swelling. R-active substances (and edible honeysuckle contains a lot of them) have anti-inflammatory, wound healing, antipyretic, antitumor, anti-aging effects.
Traditional medicine has long used honeysuckle for gastrointestinal diseases, malaria, blood diseases, kidney disease - a diuretic. The fruits are used fresh, they are used to make jam, jam, juices.
Berries do not contain any substances harmful to the human body, this is officially confirmed by research scientists.
Reproduction of edible honeysuckle - methods
Edible honeysuckle is propagated by seeds, dividing the bush, layering, it especially takes root when planted with cuttings.
The easiest way is to divide the bush, but for this you need to have an already grown overgrown shrub, which with a slight hilling gives a lot of subordinate roots. In spring or autumn, digging up the plant, you need to cut the bush into several smaller parts, each of which will take root during the transplant.
Honeysuckle seeds are very small, give rise to motley offspring when germinated. After sprouting, the aerial part grows slowly, but the root system develops well. Full fruiting of the plant occurs in 3-4 years.
Honeysuckle reproduces very well by cuttings. For rooting, annual (green) shoots are suitable. As soon as the berries begin to ripen (and this is, in fact, the first berries that ripen), you should cut the branches from the bush you like. Cuttings for rooting should not be long - it is enough to have 2-3 buds on them. Remove leaves from the handle - the top 2 leaves can be left. You can root them in a greenhouse or an ordinary flower pot. But with any method of rooting, it is necessary to create certain conditions for them.
If you decide to root the honeysuckle cuttings in the greenhouse, then they are stuck in loose soil (the ratio of sod land, humus, sand - 1: 1: 1), additionally covering them with a film or plastic bottles to create a wet microclimate. Do the same if you decide to root the cuttings in a flower pot. If the weather is hot, they should be sprayed regularly with water. After two or three weeks, start airing them, opening the film for a while or removing the plastic coating. After 1.5-2 months, the coating can be removed completely. Usually, by the beginning of autumn, honeysuckle cuttings will give an increase in shoots of at least 20-25 cm. Cuttings that you rooted in the greenhouse can be left there until spring. And cuttings rooted in pots can be planted in a permanent place - for the winter they can be covered with earth higher or covered with dry grass.
Edible honeysuckle cultivation, care features
Worst of all, in Kuban we take root after planting, Kamchatka honeysuckle is growing. Probably its adaptability to soil of volcanic origin.
In the wild, this plant grows in Altai, Eastern Siberia, the Far East, Kamchatka. This is a shrub 1-2 m tall with a spherical crown. Shoots are pubescent, whole leaves, oblong up to 5.5 cm on fruitful shoots, up to 8 cm on vegetative, opposite. The flowers are bisexual, greenish-yellow, rather large, collected in two-flowered inflorescences. This is a cross-pollinated plant, its insects pollinate.
For good productivity, it is advisable to plant at least 2-3 bushes of edible honeysuckle, you can different varieties. It blooms in the Kuban in the early spring (March-April) for 2-3 weeks, which is not dangerous during spring frosts, the flowers withstand frosts to minus 7 degrees.
Honeysuckle fruits - of various shapes - round, pear-shaped, oblong 8-30 mm long, 6-15 mm wide, weighing about 1.5 g, dark blue with a bluish bloom, sweet and sour. To taste, they resemble blueberries - fragrant, delicate, juicy. Productivity - up to 3 kg per bush.
Honeysuckle does not tolerate acidic soils, does not tolerate complete shading, but partially tolerates perfectly. The feeding area of one seedling is approximately 1 × 1.5 m.
When to plant honeysuckle? It is better to plant a honeysuckle in the fall, before it freezes it will take root. In spring, planting is best done as early as possible, because the plant wakes up very early, the buds open.
Honeysuckle how to plant? The pits for planting honeysuckle should be 60 × 60 cm in size, 50 cm deep. When planting, put stones well on the bottom, mix the ground with humus or compost, and water.
How to care for edible honeysuckle? Planting care is simple: weed removal, mulching.
Edible honeysuckle does not need annual pruning because of the longevity of its skeletal branches. It is practically resistant to diseases, pests.
One teaspoon of jam from honeysuckle berries daily - many diseases will bypass you until old age. And if you take into account that this culture is hardy, does not require maintenance, is durable, annually fruitful, beautiful, and the whole plant is healing - berries, leaves, branches, it would be an unforgivable mistake not to have several bushes of beautiful honeysuckle edible on your site.
Edible honeysuckle - varieties
Each honeysuckle variety has a different berry shape. There are berries that have the shape of a jug, a ball. There are oblong forms of berries or similar to a spindle.
Variety Bluebird
Early, with an average yield (1.5-2 kg per bush). Berries - from small to medium (0.7 g). Their shape is oval-cylindrical. Color - blue with a strong bluish coating. The taste is sweet and sour, pleasant. Disadvantages: after ripening, the berries quickly crumble.
Variety Blue Spindle
Early, early, with an average yield of 1.5-2 kg from one bush. The shape of the berries is fusiform. The average mass of the fetus is 0.8 g. Color is bluish-blue. The taste is sweet with a light spicy bitterness. Disadvantages - fruits quickly crumble after ripening.
Variety Azure
Medium-early, early, with an average yield of 1.5-2 kg from the bush. The average weight of the berries is 0.7 g. The shape of the fruit is oval-cylindrical. The color is bluish blue. The taste is very good. Advantages - do not crumble after ripening.
Variety Berel
Late, with high productivity - 2-4 kg per bush. The mass of berries is 0.9 g. Color - blue with a bluish bloom. The taste is sweet and sour with a pleasant piquant flavor. Advantages - large fruits, high productivity, berries do not crumble after ripening.
Long-fruited variety
The average ripening period, high productivity - 1.5-1.8 kg per bush. Variety of selection of the Chelyabinsk fruit and vegetable selection station them. I.V. Michurin. The average weight of the berries is 0.7 g. The shape of the fruit is oval-elongated. The color is blue. The taste is good, sweet and sour. The crop weakly crumbles after ripening, most remains on the bush.
Variety Bakcharskaya
Mid early. Breeding of the Bakcharsky stronghold of northern horticulture (Tomsk region). The mass of berries is 0.7 g. The shape of the fruit is pear-shaped. Color is violet blue. The taste is very good, sweet and sour with a pleasant aroma. Harvest almost does not crumble after ripening. Productivity is low, as this variety belongs to Turchaninov's honeysuckle. The bush is small, its diameter is half that of other varieties.
Honeysuckle Pride of the Kuban, description
Bushes are medium-sized. Frost resistance is high. The variety is a leader in productivity - an average of 3 kg per adult bush. The berries are large, sweet and sour with a dense skin and a strong waxy coating. Berries of medium-late ripening are subject to rapid shedding. The variety is resistant to disease.
Honeysuckle Bullfinch, variety description
A tall plant. It is considered the most dietary among all varieties. The taste is slightly bitter, healing. Honeysuckle berries have this property - the more bitter it is, the more healing and useful it is.
Grade Viola
Medium ripening. Large berries. They have a bitter taste. Good for hypertensive patients - help lower blood pressure.
Grade Zest
Highly winter resistant. The berries are shaped like large raisins, slightly elongated. It tastes with very weak tart bitterness, medicinal. When ripe, they almost do not crumble.
Honeysuckle Penguin, variety description
The bush is medium-sized, winter-hardy. The berries are rounded medium sized with a thin skin, sweet and sour taste, with a strawberry flavor. Flakeability of berries is average.
Malvina variety
Early ripe. The shape of the fruit is like a pear. The berries are dense, pleasant sweet and sour taste. Bushes are very decorative. They can be used in garden design for decorative hedges. They are especially beautiful during flowering.
Variety Nightingale
Very early. The berries are not very large, spindle-shaped, tuberous. The taste is sweet and sour. Fruiting is plentiful.