Decorative Horticulture in Kyrgyzstan

Floral and Decorative Design
People have been fascinated by flowers since ancient times. It is now hard to imagine large and small cities, worker settlements, and collective farm estates without green embellishments. Flowers accompany humans throughout their lives, bringing joy during holidays and everyday life, providing true aesthetic pleasure, softening life's failures, and uplifting spirits.

Recently, the passion for floriculture has become a widespread phenomenon.

In our country, scientific research on floriculture is conducted in botanical gardens and various scientific and research-production institutions, where large collections of highly decorative cultivated and wild plants are gathered, serving as a source for the constant renewal of the assortment of flowering plants for green construction and cultivation in household plots.

In Kyrgyzstan, the main role in the breeding and introduction of new species and varieties of decorative plants is performed by the Botanical Garden of the Academy of Sciences of the Kyrgyz SSR, the decorative horticulture state farm, and Kyrgyzzelenkhoz.

The use of a wide range of flowering and decorative plants in landscaping opens up great opportunities for improving the design of squares, streets, and parks in cities and other settlements of the republic, allowing for the creation of continuous flowering from early spring to late autumn. Continuous flowering corners can be created in any household plot or summer cottage.

Interacting with flowering plants, in addition to expanding knowledge in the fields of botany and biology, raises the aesthetic level of the population and connects individuals with nature, increasing their responsibility towards the environment: those who grow beauty with their own hands will not allow the destruction of what nature has created.

Flowering plants are characterized by immense diversity: each species and variety has its own peculiarities not only in appearance but also in development, requirements for environmental conditions (lighting, humidity, soil fertility, etc.), as well as planting times and methods. Therefore, novice floriculturists often have many questions regarding the selection of assortments, methods of propagation, timing of fertilization, care for plantings, etc.

CHOOSING A PLOT AND PREPARING THE SOIL

Flowering plants vary greatly in their geographical origin and adaptability to different soil and climatic conditions. This somewhat simplifies the selection of plants for various regions of our republic, which are characterized by clearly defined vertical zonality.

In Kyrgyzstan, it is practically possible to grow almost all leading flowering crops, provided they are watered.

When placing plants in a plot, it is essential to know and consider their environmental requirements.

The main requirements include lighting, moisture availability, and soil fertility.

Most flowering crops are light-loving plants, so it is necessary to allocate the most illuminated and well-visible places for them, preferably along paths, near the facade of the house, outbuildings, and along walls and fences, ensuring that the plot or cottage has a festive appearance.

The area designated for flowering plants should be carefully planned and dug to a spade's depth. Good planning will facilitate more uniform watering.

Most flowering plants prefer light, well-aerated, and fertile soils. However, in Kyrgyzstan, heavy, waterlogged clay soils often prevail, frequently containing stones and gravel. Such areas require particularly careful treatment. Stones and gravel should be removed, and 20-30 kg of peat or compost should be added per square meter, along with a mixture of mineral fertilizers calculated at 30-50 g of ammonium nitrate, 60-80 g of superphosphate, and 30-40 g of potassium salt. Flowering plants do not tolerate salinity well, so additional measures should be taken to desalinize the soil in such areas (gypsum application, leaching, etc.).

When preparing the plot, an irrigation network should be established. It should be designed so that flowers can be easily watered without harming other plants. Watering is best done with a small stream, and the soil moisture should be maintained between 60 and 80%. It is important to remember that the water needs of the same plants vary during different growth phases: during periods of intensive growth and flowering, they require more water, while during fruiting and seed ripening, they need less.

The selection of the assortment is of great importance in the design of the household plot. Along with using highly decorative leading crops, it is necessary to include less common, more modest species, as well as wild ones, which typically bloom very early in spring and better withstand all weather whims.

Skillful selection of crops will allow for maintaining decorativeness in the plot throughout the entire growing season.

When placing plants, their habitus (height, leafiness) should be taken into account, and for simultaneously flowering species, the color of the flowers should also be considered. Tall plants are usually planted in the background, while shorter ones are placed at the edges of paths. Along the paths, to emphasize them, species that maintain a compact bush form for a long time should be planted: among perennials — irises, astilbe, brunnera, hosta; among annuals — low-growing tagetes, alyssum, ageratum, gazania.

Species and varieties with bright flowers (yellow, red, orange) should be combined with dark-colored or cool-toned ones (blue, light blue). To smooth out sharp transitions from light to dark tones, species and varieties with white or very light tones can be used. Flowering plants can be combined with decorative foliage plants that have lace-like leaves (ferns, asparagus) or heavily pubescent gray-green and variegated leaves.

CARE FOR PLANTS

The decorativeness of flower beds largely depends on proper and systematic care.
Flowering plants have been cultivated for a long time on well-cultivated lands, so they have high requirements for agricultural techniques. The main care activities for flowering plants include timely watering, fertilization, removal of faded flowers, tying to supports, and pest and disease control.

Watering is best done along furrows. If the soil quickly becomes waterlogged, it should be loosened every 2-3 waterings. However, frequent superficial loosening is not very effective, as the lower layers also become compacted. Therefore, it is very beneficial to carry out 2-3 deep tillings of the inter-row spaces to a spade's depth during the growing season, and if possible, to apply organic fertilizers before tilling.

In Kyrgyzstan, late spring and early spring frosts can occur, causing significant harm to the most heat-loving crops. In this case, plants should be covered with any available material, paper caps, or mulch around the shoots with sawdust, plant residues, etc.

Special attention should be paid to protecting plants from diseases and pests. Measures to combat them are described in specialized literature.

When using potent chemical substances, it is important to remember that frequent treatments are undesirable, so it is better to conduct preventive measures in a timely manner, which include using only healthy planting material, disease-resistant varieties, treating seeds before sowing, and disinfecting the soil.

Plants can attract not only harmful but also beneficial insects, so it is essential to be able to recognize them.

Agricultural techniques play a significant role in protecting plants from diseases and pests. For example, deep tilling of the soil helps eliminate caterpillars and larvae of moths, fireworms, beetles, and other insects, while timely weed removal improves their nutrition. Some plants (gladiolus, phlox, etc.) do not tolerate the application of fresh manure before planting—this can lead to the development of diseases.

All control measures should be carried out in a timely manner, preventing severe damage to the plants.

PROPAGATION OF PLANTS

Flowering plants are propagated by seeds and vegetatively. Annuals are propagated by seeds, while perennials are propagated by species that reliably pass their traits to offspring. Modern varieties of leading crops are complex hybrids, and when propagated by seeds, they lose their primary decorative qualities, so they are propagated only vegetatively, i.e., by tubers, bulbs, rhizomes, cuttings, and grafting.

Rhizomatous plants that flower in the summer-autumn period (perennial asters, helenium, delphinium, rudbeckia, phlox) are propagated by division in early spring or in the fall after flowering. Early flowering plants (primrose, iris, dicentra, lily of the valley, peony) are better divided and transplanted in late summer to early autumn, so they can root well and start growing in spring on time.

Bulbous plants that winter in the ground (daffodils, lilies, tulips, muscari, hyacinths) are planted only in the fall (September - October).

Most perennials can be left in one place for 4-5 years, no longer, as the rhizomes age, the soil becomes heavily compacted, and infested with rhizomatous weeds, resulting in a decrease in the number of generative shoots, smaller flower sizes, and increased susceptibility to diseases.

Propagation by cuttings is mostly done in spring, less often in early summer or autumn. In February, one can start taking cuttings of dahlias, in March — of chrysanthemums, carnations, and ground cover plants. In open ground, in special warm or cold greenhouses, boxes, or soil, phloxes, peonies, and others are propagated by cuttings.

For cuttings, green stems are used in spring, and semi-woody stems in summer with 3-4 buds. They are cut at a node, some leaves are completely removed, and others are shortened. The lower cut of the cutting is placed in fine-grained sand, previously sprinkled with a 2-3 cm layer on the soil. 1-2 buds should be left on the surface, and to promote better rooting, the cuttings are covered with glass or plastic wrap, sprayed 2-3 times a day, and watered.

To enhance rooting, cuttings are treated with growth stimulators.

Grafting is used for propagating shrubs — roses, lilacs, and others.