The coniferous spruce plant grows almost everywhere. There are many varieties of this evergreen tree. One of the most beautiful is the Engelman spruce. About its varieties, when to plant and how to care for it, read the article.
General information
Spruce Engelman from the genus Spruce of the Pine family. In its natural environment, its habitat covers the rocky mountains of the forest belt of North America. Grows in the shade of mountain slopes and valleys at high altitude, 1500-3500 meters above ground level in vast areas of pure and mixed forests.
Its neighbors of the lower zone in the place of growth can be monochromatic and pretty firs, western hemlocks, larches, lodgepole pines, and the upper zone - subalpine firs, mountain hemlocks, Lyell larches, blond, soft pines.
As an ornamental coniferous species, it has been cultivated in Europe for a long time, since the middle of the 19th century, and in Russia since the end of the same century. Engelman spruce – fast growing tree. It has not received wide distribution, since few regions are suitable for its growth. Lives on average three hundred to four hundredyears, but in some cases the duration of her life reaches six hundred years. It has high frost resistance.
Characteristic of the species
This is an evergreen plant with high decorative qualities. Despite the fact that each form of this plant has properties that distinguish it from other spruces, they all fit the description of "large". Indeed, this plant reaches twenty meters or more in height and ninety centimeters in diameter. Its powerful coniferous cover measures three centimeters long and two millimeters wide.
Besides, the Engelman spruce, whatever its type, is characterized by a special position of the branches: they are all slightly tilted down, as if crying. The dense crown is cone-shaped and often asymmetrical. Thin bark with numerous cracks covered with scales. It has a reddish brown color. Young shoots have a yellowish tinge.
The buds are cone-shaped, and the needles are tetrahedral. It is sharp, with two to four stomatal lines visible on each side. The color of the needles of a young spruce is bluish-green, and an old tree is green. Growing in their places of origin, spruces do not drop needles from branches for fifteen years.
Description of fruits
Cones have an ovoid-cylindrical shape. On the branches are in a hanging position. Their length reaches four to seven centimeters, width - two and a half. Immature buds are burgundy in color, while mature buds are light brown in color. Toothed scales are located loosely on the surface. Ripening time is August or September. Cones fall in the spring next year, while they do not crumble.
Seeds are located in the axils of scales. Their length is three millimeters. They are painted brown and have one wing twelve millimeters long. The seeds are very small. For comparison: one thousand pieces of seeds weigh only three grams.
Use
Spruce is often a guest in foreign gardens. It looks better in single plantings, although it does not lose its decorative effect even in group plantings from a small number of specimens. It is planted in squares, along the roads of city streets, in squares. Used to create alley zones.
This variety of coniferous trees has several varieties. The most popular is the Engelmann Glauka spruce. Some trees are dwarfed, with a small stature and an unusual color for us, which is white.
Glauka spruce canadian
The name speaks for itself: this species of coniferous trees is American. Spruce is the main species in the formation of the Canadian taiga. A tree can grow at a height of one thousand five hundred meters. According to the climatic conditions of growth, it is an analogue of the Siberian spruce. Therefore, Siberia is a second home for Glauka.
In Latin, the name of the spruce means "gray". Although many spruces have decorative gray forms. But for the Canadian variety, such coloring of needles is the norm. Growing in its natural environment, spruce has a less bright color of needles than cultivated trees, and a greater height, up tothirty meters. The crown is dense, cone-shaped, up to two meters in diameter. In young trees, the branches are directed tangentially upwards, while in old fir trees they are lowered down.
Lives a long time, three hundred to five hundred years. Grows on soils of any composition, but prefers loamy soils with good drainage. Engelmann spruce glauca is resistant to Siberian frosts. Garden forms and varieties of Canadian spruce (there are many) reproduce vegetatively. The main method is rooting cuttings.
Short varieties are called snowy. Their growth in Siberia does not cause problems. But other varietal varieties need shading during the period of bright winter and early spring rays of the sun. This is especially true for conical trees.
Spruce Pendula Serbian
This is the most beautiful weeping tree species. Spruce Engelman Pendula reaches a height of twelve meters at the age of twenty years. It grows ten to fifteen centimeters per year. And ten years later its height is fifteen meters. The crown is wide, its diameter is one and a half meters. Flexible shoots hang down. Flat needles are green, with a whitish coating below, and up to two centimeters long.
Spruce prefers neutral soils and moderate moisture. Does not tolerate compacted soils and stagnant water. Therefore, it must be planted away from the accumulation of a large amount of groundwater. At the bottom of the landing pit, a layer of drainage with a thickness of twenty centimeters should be laid. To do this, you can use a broken brick orsand. For group plantings, the distance between spruce trees should be two to three meters. Landing pits are deep, fifty to seventy centimeters. When planting, the neck of the root does not go deep into the ground, it should be on the same level with the ground surface.
For better survival of seedlings, you can independently prepare the soil from sod and leaf soil, sand and peat. Two parts of the first two components are mixed and one each of the last. As soon as the planting is over, the seedlings are watered with plenty of water: forty to fifty liters in each hole. Simultaneously with irrigation, fertilizers are applied: nitroammofoska and rootin, respectively, one hundred and ten grams per bucket of water.
Spruce Engelman, whose photo is presented for review, does not tolerate dry weather. In extreme heat, it needs watering, which should be carried out weekly, once is enough. Each tree is watered with ten buckets of water. The soil in the near-stem circle should be loosened regularly to a depth of five centimeters, to prevent the formation of a crust, and for the winter it should be mulched with peat six centimeters thick. After a cold period, the mulch is not removed, but mixed with the soil.
During the vegetative season, fertilizers are applied twice. Spruces are pruned in exceptional cases, when their shoots form a hedge. It is better to leave this procedure at the end of May or the beginning of June, since at this time the active movement of the juice stops. He althy branches are not removed. The tree gets rid of dry and diseased branches.
Spruce Bush Lace
The name of this species variety is translated from English as "Bush lace". This tree reaches a height of seven meters, a width of about two. At the age of ten, its height is two and a half meters. It grows thirty centimeters in a year.
Spruce Engelman Leys is extraordinarily beautiful. The central conductor is strong, the branches have an interesting feature. At the base they are raised, and their tips are drooping. The branches form a wide skirt around the trunk. The narrow crown of the spruce is vertical, with a rich blue color of the needles. The unusual shape and unusual color of the needles attract connoisseurs of beauty. Spruce is used for landscaping areas as a tapeworm and in group plantings.
