Barberry Golden Rocket - description and cultivation

Barberry Golden Rocket (Berberis Thunbergii Golden rocket) is an excellent ornamental plant that can decorate any garden. The culture is often used in landscape design and is characterized by unpretentious care. Before planting this variety of barberry, you need to study its description.

Barberry Golden Rocket: description and features

The Golden Rocket Thunberg barberry is a columnar shrub characterized by tough shoots tending vertically upward. They reach 1.5 m in height and 50 cm in diameter.

Barberry of this variety has excellent decorative properties.

The shrub develops rather slowly. It has yellow-green leaves. Against the background of reddish shoots, they look quite impressive.

The flowers are light yellow in color and appear in late spring. With the arrival of autumn, red berries ripen on the bushes.

How to plant barberry on the site

The crop should be planted in sunny areas that may have a little shade. In the absence of the sun, the leaves can lose their yellow color and turn green.

Planting from seeds

For planting barberry in this way, ripe fruits are needed. You need to remove the bones from them and dry them. Before planting, the seeds should be washed in a weak solution of potassium permanganate.

It is recommended to plant this type of barberry before winter. Thanks to this, it is possible to achieve natural stratification. The sprouts will appear only next year.

After 12-18 months, the bushes need to be planted on a permanent site.

Planting seedlings in open ground

It is necessary to plant Golden Rocket barberry bushes in spring or autumn. This culture requires a well-lit space. If you plant a bush in the shade, its leaves will become pale in color.

For a day, the roots of the seedling should be placed in a solution of potassium permanganate. To plant a plant, you need to follow these steps:

1. Dig a hole at least 60 cm in size.
2. Lay out a drainage layer. It can consist of crushed stone, crushed brick, sand.
3. Fill the well with fertile soil.
4. Plant a bush and lightly compact the soil.
5. Water the plant.
6. Prune the shoots, leaving a few buds on them. This will ensure that the culture takes root.

When carrying out planting work, it is important to follow the basic rules.

How to care for Golden Rocket barberry

To succeed in growing the Thunberg Golden Rocket barberry, he needs to provide complete and high-quality care.

• Watering

The crop needs to be moistened only during prolonged drought. The rest of the time the bush has enough rainfall.

To avoid water spreading during watering, you need to make a roller around the perimeter of the trunk circle. Its height should be 10 cm. From under the bush, you must select the soil to get a large hole.

For irrigation, you must use warm water, which is recommended to be poured at the root. After moistening the soil, it must be loosened and weeds removed.

• Top dressing

It is best to fertilize the crop with organic means. To do this, in the spring, when digging up the soil, you need to add compost or humus.

In autumn, the soil should be covered with a mulch layer, which consists of loose organic matter. Peat or compost is perfect for this.

• Pruning

The plant does not need to be pruned. Sometimes it is necessary to shorten branches that are too long, which stick out in different directions. Pruning can also be done to remove frozen shoots.

Barberry does not need regular pruning

Reproduction methods

You can propagate barberry in different ways:

• Cuttings. To propagate a culture in this way, it is necessary to cut cuttings from well-developed shoots. This is done in the spring before the leaves bloom. Planting material should be placed in the ground and covered with foil. To speed up the emergence of roots, you need to use growth stimulants. When new leaves appear, the film can be removed. Plants need moderate watering and loosening of the soil. It is worth replanting them to a permanent site in the fall.
• Division of the bush. For the procedure, the bush must be carefully pulled out of the ground and cut into fragments. Each of them must have growth buds and roots. The plant is immediately planted in a permanent place.
• Layers. In the spring, you need to take annual branches and bend them to the ground. Fasten with a bracket and cover with soil. Water the plant periodically. By the fall, it has developed roots.
• Seeds. It is necessary to collect planting material from ripe fruits. To do this, you need to remove the bones and dry them. It is worth planting barberry before winter. This will provide the planting material with stratification. The sprouts will appear next year. The first fruits should be expected only after 2-3 years.

Diseases and pests

The crop can be affected by diseases and pests. The shrub is often susceptible to fungal infections. In this case, the leaves wither and dry out. To cope with the problem, it is recommended to apply fungicides.

Of the pests, the bushes most often suffer from the barberry aphid. At the same time, from the seamy side of the leaves, you can see yellow-red insects that absorb the juices of the plant. As a result, the leaves dry out and begin to crumble. This creates problems with the formation of flower buds.

As a preventive measure, it is recommended to spray the bushes with folk infusions and remedies. For example, for this you can insist pureed garlic and add laundry soap to the mixture. An infusion of tobacco is considered an equally effective recipe.

Plant diseases are accompanied by the appearance of spots on the foliage.

Preparing for winter

Before the arrival of frost, the soil around the bushes must be insulated. To do this, sprinkle it with peat, compost, crushed bark. Sawdust is also great.

Use in landscape design

The culture has excellent decorative properties. Therefore, it can be used to decorate garden plots. An excellent solution would be to use the plant as a hedge. In this case, the bushes should be placed at short intervals. In this case, the plants require systematic pruning.

An excellent solution would be a combination of a culture with yellow-pink leaves with evergreen conifers. Barberry can be used to decorate mixborders. Moreover, it should be combined with cultures of contrasting colors.

You need to choose plants according to shades and shape. An excellent option would be to use barberry as a tapeworm.

Barberry of this variety is often used to decorate plots.

Healing properties

In folk medicine, you can use different plant fragments. Depending on the part chosen and the cooking method, it is possible to achieve the following effects:

• strengthen the immune system;
• to activate the work of the digestive organs;
• stop bleeding;
• cleanse the blood;
• reduce the likelihood of tumor formation.

Important! Barberry has a rather powerful effect on the body. Therefore, before using it, you should consult with a specialist.

Barberry of this variety is an excellent ornamental plant that can decorate any site. This is a fairly unpretentious crop that does not need frequent watering or feeding. Therefore, it is very popular with gardeners.