How to grow balsam. Planting and caring for garden balsam

This plant is grown as an annual. Garden balsam boasts long-lasting flowering and low maintenance requirements. Why not grow it on your own plot?

These incredibly beautiful annual flowers are also called wet roly-poly . In botany, the correct name for this plant is garden balsam. The height of the flowers varies from 25 cm (reasonable for a small flower bed) to 70 cm (tall bushes look good if lower flowering plants are planted in front of them).

Description of balsam

Garden balsam, also known as Impatiens balsamum, got its name for its great sensitivity. You just need to lightly touch the bud, and the seeds immediately fall off - the flower is in a hurry to give new life.

The plant reaches up to 70 cm in height. A very heat-loving flower, it can die at the slightest frost. It has large, irregularly shaped leaves, slightly pointed with small teeth. The flowers are ordinary or double, and have a wide range of colors - white, purple, red, lilac and others. The flowering time of balsam is from June to September or until the first frost.

Garden balsam has several more popular names:

“Vanka wet” - so named because of the droplets that form on the leaves. They appear on the eve of bad weather. For this plant it could quite deservedly be called the people's barometer;
“Hardworking Lizzie” or “Diligent Lisa” - this is how the flower is called for its long flowering;
“Beautiful wreath” - the balsam received this name for its luxurious appearance.

Unfortunately, breeders are not particularly interested in this species. In nature, there are only three varieties of garden balsam:

tall "Camellia Flowerd";
the short "Baby Bush";
short "Tom Thumb".

Features of a houseplant

This plant has low shoots that are prone to branching. The leaves are green, with a reddish or bronze tint. If there is high humidity in the room, then drops of water form on the tips of the leaves . Because of this feature, balsam is also called Vanka-wet.

Due to its beautiful and low bushes, the flower is grown as an hanging plant. Impatiens flowers are axillary. Their color varies depending on the variety. They can be variegated, dotted with stripes or dots. Breeders managed to develop terry varieties. You will learn a more detailed description of indoor balsam, as well as the features of caring for it, here, and about what care should be like at home to preserve the beauty of its flowering, read here.

Obtaining garden balsam seeds

The easiest way is to buy seeds in a specialized store. But if you want to grow balsam from flowers that already grow in your garden, you can get the seeds from the buds yourself:

The seeds ripen in juicy green boxes; this happens by the end of August.
Take seeds from unripe flowers, since a well-ripened capsule can crumble in your hands at the slightest touch, and you will lose the seeds.
The boxes are stored in a dry room until fully ripe.
To check whether the boxes are ready for collecting seeds, you just need to lightly touch them - a mature box will immediately open.

Seed storage rules

If you feel that the seeds are still not completely dry, you need to dry them so that they do not spoil during storage:

Place the seeds in paper boxes.
Place the boxes in well-ventilated, dry places, away from water and moisture.
Stir the seeds periodically to prevent them from becoming moldy.

Rules for storing seeds:

Place the dried seeds in paper envelopes or small boxes.
Be sure to sign each box or envelope. Indicate the name of the plant, year and month of seed collection.
Store seeds for no longer than 8 years at a temperature of 0 - +10 ° C, relative humidity about 60%.

When to plant

In order to get beautiful flowering plants, you need to choose the planting date wisely.

General planting times

In the Moscow region and other parts of the European territory of Russia, planting seeds is allowed from the first ten days of March. In the southern regions, you can move this date to February. In the rest of the country, this is not recommended, since the growing season of the crop does not last too long.

Lucky dates according to the lunar calendar

In order to successfully sow balsam seeds, they also resort to the help of the lunar calendar. In accordance with it, in 2022, favorable days for the procedure are:

February 21-25;
March 12-17, 19-20;
April 6-8, 11-13, 15-17, 29-30;
May 8-17, 21-23, 26-28;
June 1-2, 5-6, 9-13, 16-20.

It is not recommended to plant seeds on the following dates:

March 6, 7, 21;
April 5, 19;
May 5, 19;
June 3, 4, 17.

Growing balsam from seeds

Before growing balsam from seeds, you need to germinate them:

In order for the seeds to take root and beautiful, healthy flowers to grow from them, it is necessary to carefully prepare slightly acidic soil for seedlings. Two types of soil are suitable. The first is humus, compost, sod and perlite in equal parts. The second is 1 part sand and peat, 2 parts leaf soil.
The soil must be heated at a high temperature and treated with a fungicide to kill pests and various fungi. It is better to sow seeds in February. In this case, by the end of April you will have strong seedlings, which will subsequently produce early flowering.
Before sowing, dip the seeds in a weak solution of manganese for 10 minutes, then in warm water for another 30 minutes. Moisten the soil, plant the seeds and sprinkle them with a 3 mm layer of sterile sand. In order to maintain constant humidity and temperature not lower than +24 - +26 ° C, boxes with seedlings are packed in plastic bags or covered with film.
When the first shoots appear, the temperature can be lowered to +20° C and additional lighting can be provided to the seedlings. If there is insufficient light, the sprouts will stretch out greatly and become fragile.
There is another method of germinating seeds - using fabric. To do this, the seeds are wrapped in a wet cloth, which is constantly moistened with water until the sprouts begin to appear. After this, they are planted in prepared soil.

Picking seedlings:

When the seedlings sprout the first small leaves, you can start picking. To do this, you need to prepare a separate glass or small pot for each sprout. Fill them with the same soil in which the seeds were planted.
Be sure to make several small holes in the bottom of the dish through which excess moisture will escape. Make small depressions in the ground.
Carefully remove each seedling from the common box and transplant them into prepared glasses.
After picking, spray the seedlings with water from a spray bottle. Then moisten the seedlings as needed if the soil is dry. When 6-8 leaves appear on the seedlings, pinch the top, then the balsam bush will be more lush and the roots will be stronger.

Conditions and time

How to plant correctly?

Immediately after purchasing balsam, it must be replanted . There is a certain algorithm of actions:

Use a pot slightly larger than the previous one.
Prepare fresh soil mixture or use store-bought one. If the first option is chosen, then combine the following components: turf soil, humus, coarse river sand (8:2:1).
Transfer the plant to a new container, pre-moisten the soil.
Add soil to the edges of the pot, but do not compact it.
Water carefully and place on a windowsill out of direct sunlight.

If the balsam was purchased in winter, then it should not be replanted until spring. At rest, the flower will not tolerate this procedure well. When purchasing a flowering balsam, you need to wait until the buds fall off.

Before planting, you need to carefully assess the condition of the root system . Healthy roots should be completely encircled by the earthen ball. It is advisable to shake off the soil and wash the roots only if rot, diseases or insects are detected.

How to root?

Rooting balsam occurs in two ways:

In the substrate .
A soilless mixture consisting of sand, perlite, vermiculite and peat is suitable for this. Even weak and young tops can be rooted in such a substrate. Plant the cuttings in small depressions and sprinkle with soilless mixture. Pour a weakly concentrated solution of potassium permanganate and cover with polyethylene. Due to the greenhouse effect, humidity and heat are constantly retained inside.
In water .
Prepare soft warm water and pour it into a suitable container, for example, a plastic cup. Then you must remove the lower leaves from the cutting and place it in water to a depth of 4 cm.
The roots will appear quickly, within a week. Transplantation into the ground is possible provided that the roots are already 2-3 cm long.

You will find all the details on how to propagate balsam from cuttings in this article.

Growing balsam from cuttings

Not everyone has the patience and time to grow balsam from seeds, but at the same time there is no opportunity to buy a lot of ready-made seedlings. In such cases, you can buy one flower in a pot and cut it out. Cuttings can be carried out both in winter and autumn. In order for garden balsam grown by cuttings to produce lush flowering, the following must be taken into account:

You will need shoots 5-6 cm long, with at least 3 leaves.
To begin, place the flower pot in a dark place. When the branches stretch out, cut them with a sharp knife or blade and place them in glasses of water for rooting. Make sure that the leaves do not end up in the water, otherwise they will begin to rot.
After 7-10 days, the cuttings will take root and will be ready to be transplanted into the ground. Maintain the room temperature at least 20-22° C and provide good lighting. Do not overdo it with watering the soil so that the roots of the seedlings do not rot.

Top dressing

It is better to fertilize 2 times a week - simultaneously with watering. The proportions are usually written on the packaging of fertilizer for flower plants. However, experienced gardeners advise adding half as much water as recommended. Balsam also responds well to fertilizers for geraniums .

Nitrogen fertilizers are good for young shoots that have not produced flower buds. But for flowering ones, it is better to use fertilizers with potassium and phosphorus, sometimes replacing them with nitrogen. At the end of summer, fertilization is stopped.

Transplanting balsam into open ground

Unlike most finicky plants, balsam is not capricious and will not make growing difficult. In order to grow a bush, the gardener does not need special efforts. When choosing a landing site, keep in mind that:

Garden balsam feels good with any neighbors. He is patient with begonia, fuchsia, verbena and is not at all against the proximity to ageratum.
Impatiens grow best on eastern and western sides.
The main conditions for growing balsam are the absence of stagnant moisture, constant dampness, drafts and frequent cold weather.
Impatiens prefers to grow in loose, nutritious soil with reliable expanded clay drainage.
The plant does not like heat and acidic soil. Under these conditions, it stops blooming, its leaves fall off and the flower fades.
When you decide on a place to plant balsam, do not forget to fertilize the soil well with humus.

Preparing seedlings

By the beginning of May, the seedlings will be ready for planting in the ground. But weather conditions do not always allow this to be done before June. In order for the flowers to reliably take root in a new place and bloom beautifully, the seedlings need to be prepared a little:

Start lowering the temperature in the room where the seedlings lived.
Gradually accustom the seedlings to outdoor conditions - take the cups with flowers to the balcony or outside, if possible. Start with 10 minutes, increasing the time by another 10 minutes every day.

Planting seedlings in flower beds

The soil is already ready, the seedlings too, you can start planting flowers:

Well moisten the soil in which the seedlings grew 2-3 hours before transplanting.
Make depressions in the ground at a distance of no closer than 25-30 cm from each other.
Fertilize each hole with humus and add a little water.
Carefully, so as not to damage the roots, remove the seedlings from the ground and transplant them into a hole in the ground.
Compact the soil around each flower and mulch it to protect the soil from overheating and retain moisture.

You can see in the photo how balsam grown from seeds will turn out.

general characteristics

Impatiens is an ornamental plant that is available in a wide range of colors and varieties. The genus Impatiens includes about 500 species of plants of tropical origin, grown as annual or perennial flowers in garden beds and at home. Impatiens are characterized by very rapid growth. In fact, in a short time, numerous fleshy and succulent stems emerge from the shallow and grouped root system, covered with translucent dark green leaves with jagged edges.

During the flowering period from late spring to early winter, single or spherical flattened flowers appear at the tops of the stems and at the base of the leaf axils in various shades of red, pink, white and purple. In the center of the flowers, fruits ripen - small oblong capsules containing spherical black seeds that can be used for propagation.

Caring for garden balsam

Balsam is very unpretentious and easy to care for. But still, there are some recommendations for caring for this beautiful flower:

The most important thing is to water the plants on time. Due to lack of moisture within 2-3 days, the leaves immediately begin to fade, curl into a tube, then completely wither and fall off. Never water flowers during the day when the sun is at its zenith. Do this in the evening, after sunset. And, of course, if it rains, the plants will not need additional watering.
Be sure to remove dried flowers from the stems, then your flowers will grow more actively and longer.
Feed the flowers with fertilizers every 15 days, then they will delight you with a riot of color for a long time. As a top dressing, use a complex fertilizer of potassium and nitrogen.

Diseases and pests of balsam

Like any other plant, garden balsam is susceptible to some diseases:

Cucumber mosaic - damaged flowers stop growing, leaves become wavy, covered with yellow spots and holes. Damaged leaves must be torn off. As a preventive measure, active control of aphids that carry the virus is used.
Ring mosaic - the leaves seem to become woody, crack and become covered with spots in the form of ring fingerprints. The flower gradually fades and eventually dies. Affected leaves should be removed.
Bronzing of leaves - slows down the growth of leaves and causes their deformation, after which they wrinkle and fall off. Plants affected by the virus are removed.
Viral mosaic - leaves become covered with yellow spots and take on a wavy shape. For prevention, plants are treated with a remedy against aphids and thrips, which spread this virus.
Spider mite - the mite weaves its web on the lower part of the leaves, which it gradually eats. For prevention, plants are treated with soap and affected leaves are removed.

As you can see, growing and caring for balsam is not such a difficult process. The most important thing to consider is that balsam is not at all picky, but does not tolerate frost and direct sunlight. When growing a flower from seeds and cuttings, it is necessary to maintain temperature and light conditions and regularly moisten the seedlings. After planting plants in the ground, we must not forget about timely watering and fertilizing balsam, as well as carry out disease prevention. If you follow all the recommendations, garden balsam will thank you with beautiful flowering throughout the summer.

Picking seedlings

Growing garden balsam from seed involves diving. This procedure is very important for the further development of plants. When young seedlings reach 1.5 centimeters in height, they need to be planted in separate cups. To do this, you need to take the same soil as when planting, not forgetting to pour a drainage layer into each container. During diving, elongated plants must be buried deeper into the soil than seeds. If you provide the transplanted plants with enough heat and sunlight, they will grow very quickly. About a week after picking, it is necessary to pinch the tops of the plants. This procedure will cause additional formation of shoots, which will affect the decorative qualities of the bush.