The creeping or creeping juniper is a spectacular, low-growing plant popular in landscape design. Its varieties are of North American or Canadian origin. Due to its high resistance to cold and unpretentiousness, this ephedra has become a favorite of gardeners, both experienced and beginners.
Creeping juniper: popular varieties
Brief information about the variety
- Colour: green, blue, golden.
- Height: 10-50 cm.
- Crown width: up to 2 m.
- In which regions is it growing: middle strip of Russia.
- Landing features: in a sunny place or in partial shade.
- Immunity: tall.
- Life span: up to 300 years and more.
Popular varieties
Creeping juniper is represented by a large number of varieties that differ in size, shades and crown shape.
- Green Carpet - a lush classic juniper with a cushion-shaped crown resembling a fluffy carpet;
- Blue Chip is a plant of a bright blue hue, with thorny needles and spectacular twigs that fold into a "star";
- Andorra Variegata is an interesting rounded variety with creamy splashes;
- Wiltoni is an original variety with obliquely growing, dense, bluish-silvery shoots;
- Golden Carpet - differs in the golden color of a young growth, which looks doubly impressive in combination with old greenish needles;
- Blue Forest is a plant with short skeletal branches, shaped like a miniature spruce forest.
By the color of the needles, most of them can be divided into green, blue and golden.
Some varieties change color by winter, for example, they turn purple.
Description of the plant
This type of juniper is also called "creeping", "spread", "ground cover", "horizontal".
The branches of the plant spread along the ground, creating a continuous carpet, which is a valuable property for landscaping.
In height, the bushes reach from 10 to 50 cm, and in width they grow up to 1-2 m. The shape of the crown can be cushion, round or spreading.
The twigs are covered with needles - scales or needles. The length of the needles is usually 2-5 mm. The color is presented in various shades of green, gold, silver and blue.
Fruits are rounded cones, most often dark blue with a bluish bloom. The root system is superficial and well-branched.
Growing regions
This species is highly resistant to cold weather. All varieties are suitable for growing in central Russia (Chernozem, Central, North-West and Volga regions).
Many frost-resistant varieties thrive in Siberia and the Urals. In the southern regions, it is recommended to shade young plants from sunburn.
Landing
We plant rooted seedlings
For planting, it is better to buy seedlings with a closed root system - they are more convenient to plant and they take root faster. Usually such plants are supplied with special fertilizers of prolonged action.
Please note that the soil in the container is moist, and the branches of the bush are elastic, with the growth of the current year. The needles should sit firmly on the branches and not crumble.
Landing place
Creeping junipers like sunny areas or light partial shade.
They can grow in the shade, but this negatively affects the splendor of the crown and the brightness of the color.
The plant is unpretentious to the soils - moderately moist and rather loose soils with a neutral or slightly acidic reaction are suitable. It is better to choose a landing site away from groundwater.
Landing technology
The landing hole should be twice the size of the earthen coma and be deep enough - 50-70 cm.
Before planting a juniper, a drainage layer (sand or broken clay brick) is laid in the hole, water is poured and allowed to soak. The removed soil is mixed with peat and sand.
The plant is planted so that the root collar remains at ground level. The land is well tamped, watered and mulched.
Care
This type does not require special care and almost does not cause trouble.
Young seedlings need more care: unlike adults, they need to be mulched, covered for the winter and watered more often.
This culture is unpretentious, but by paying attention to it, you will create disease prevention and, as a result, get a spectacular ornamental bush.
Watering
Juniper is content with moderate watering and adequately tolerates temporary drought.
If precipitation falls regularly, you don't need to water it at all, but in dry hot periods this is done 2-3 times a week. In the evenings, you need to sprinkle the needles.
Top dressing
The shrub is fed once a season - in early spring. As fertilizers, special mineral complexes for conifers or nitroammofosk are used.
If the plant has undergone stress or is frozen over in winter, it is sprayed or watered with drugs like Epin.
Mulching and loosening
It is necessary to loosen the soil shallowly (by 5-6 cm) so as not to damage the root system, placed close to the surface. Usually, loosening is done after watering, combining with weeding.
The trunk circle of young seedlings is mulched with peat, sawdust or wood chips. An adult shrub grows in a solid carpet without the need for weeding or mulching.
Haircut and trim
Often, creeping species do not need a shaping haircut. If desired, they can be given a more regular shape or the thickened crown can be thinned out.
Sanitary pruning is required: it is done in the spring, before the start of sap flow - dry and damaged shoots are removed.
Preparing for winter
An adult ephedra successfully tolerates frosts - it does not need to be covered for the winter. Young seedlings in the open field are covered with spruce branches, and peat chips are poured into the tree trunk circle.
In late February and early March, it is better to shade the plants to avoid sunburn.
Reproduction
We cut and propagate ourselves
Most often, ground cover junipers propagate vegetatively.
Cutting is carried out in the spring, cutting off branches with a "heel" 10 cm long and deepening into a nutritious substrate (pre-soaked in Kornevin).
The cuttings are placed in a greenhouse, regularly ventilated and watered. It will take 2-3 months to root them, after which transplantation into open ground is possible.
Reproduction by layering is also popular. This method takes more time, but gives much less trouble: the branch on the parent bush is bent to the ground and simply fixed with wire.
Previously, the shoot site is cleaned of leaves, a small incision is made and sprinkled with a root formation stimulator.
The roots appear on the branch within a year, after which it can be cut off and a bush can be planted.
Diseases and pests
In conditions of waterlogging, juniper can be affected by fungi. He is threatened by shute, fusarium, rust.
You should not plant it in places where rain and melt water accumulates, as well as in the vicinity of fruit crops. For prevention, the bushes are treated with Bordeaux liquid and copper-containing preparations.
The plant is damaged by scale insects, aphids, mealybugs, moths, and larvae of May beetles.
Birds are natural enemies of pests - they need to be attracted to the garden in order to prevent insect infestations.
The culture should be regularly inspected and, at the first sign, washed with a solution of laundry soap. If the problem is not solved, it is necessary to use insecticides.
In landscape design
Creeping juniper is very popular in the design of gardens and manor yards, summer cottages, public gardens, parks.
It successfully adapts to urban conditions, tolerates pruning well, and requires very little maintenance.
It is often used as a spectacular lawn, create live borders, decorative frames for flower beds and flower beds, and is used in mixborders (for the lower tier).
With proper care, the shrub can be grown not only in the open field, but also in a container way. A bush planted in a pot has to be cut and shaped more often, but it becomes possible to move it.
Ephedra is suitable for decorating small courtyards without planting land, landscaping balconies, roofs and terraces, and decorating building facades.
It is in harmony with flowers, ornamental grasses, deciduous and coniferous plants. And looks great in rockeries, rock gardens, rocky gardens, landscapes of the English and Japanese style.
Juniper horizontal in garden design.
The juniper is horizontal. How to reproduce ?!
Juniper horizontal Blue Chip care / Juniper planting and care / conifers
Reviews
According to the description, the creeping group of junipers cannot be called fast-growing. If you want to quickly grow a "fluffy rug" in your area, you need to increase the amount of dressings (but no more than 3 times a season).
Judging by the reviews, these varieties are not difficult to reproduce at home.
If it is important to get seedlings as quickly as possible, they use the cuttings method, and if you need a simple and easy way, they do it by layering.
Ephedra tolerates pruning well and retains the correct crown shape for a long time.
Many gardeners, before trimming the shrub, feed it with nitrogen (some do it after the procedure).
If twigs about 10 cm in length remain from the haircut, they are used for reproduction. When grown in a container, junipers can even be clipped under bonsai.