Common reed: description, application, photo

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:45

Common reed is a tall herbaceous erect plant growing along the banks of reservoirs, lakes, floodplains, swamps, sea spits and wet meadows, often at a depth of one and a half meters.

Common reed: description

This is a cosmopolitan plant that can be found almost everywhere except deserts and the Arctic.

The height of such a perennial can sometimes reach 4-5 meters, the hollow stem is 2 centimeters in diameter. After flowering, the straight stem becomes woody. The gray-green leaves of the reed are linear-lanceolate, elongated and characterized by stiffness and cutting edges. Under gusts of strong winds, they can bend down to the water surface, practically touching it, while never breaking.

Inflorescence - a large fluffy panicle (purple or silver), consisting of a large number of small spikelets. Reed pollination occurs with the help of wind, flowering is observed in July-September. The fruits are grains, which ripen in late summer - early autumn. They do not fall off for a long time and attract attention with fluffy silvery-brown sultans. In winter, this plantcovered with a blanket of snow, it looks majestic, giving the pond, along the perimeter of which it grows, a cute, cozy look. Its loud rustling with dried shoots in the wind is unmistakable, it seems to protect the inhabitants of the reservoir from bad weather.

Ecological use of cane

Reed rhizomes are long, grow strongly, constantly capturing new territories. It is with their help that the reproduction of the reed occurs. Its thickets are dense and impenetrable, and are of great ecological importance. Placed in swampy areas, common reed (photos show the mass distribution of its distribution) dries them, transforming them into dry areas.

This happens due to the mass of stems and leaves that absorb a large amount of moisture from the soil and evaporate it. The formation of peat also occurs due to reeds. This plant is used for feeding livestock. Elks, nutrias and muskrats are happy to eat its tough stems, which are also used in agriculture for silage.

Use of cane in the national economy

Common reed is an excellent material for the production of baskets, mats, light furniture for summer cottages, musical instruments. It is a natural raw material for the manufacture of cardboard and paper. In treeless areas, dry reed stalks are used as fuel, and roofs are also covered with such high-quality sound and heat insulating material. Translated from Latin, Phragmites means "fence", "wattle fence". Productionadobe brick is based on a cut from the shoots of this coastal plant. Cane is also used as vegetable fertilizer and even to produce alcohol.

Oxygenator Plant

With its help, sands are fixed, as well as the degree of water pollution is reduced. Common reed (the family to which it belongs is cereals) is an oxygenating plant that plays an important role in keeping the pond clean. It is planted in the deep part of the reservoir and regularly pruned due to its erratic growth.

For a small reservoir, 2-3 plants will be enough, for a larger area, several types of oxygenators are recommended, which, in addition to reeds, include submerged hornwort, common telorez, water buttercup, elodea, curly pondweed.

Harm cane in agriculture

For agriculture, common reed is considered a pernicious weed that has become widespread on irrigated lands. Rice, alfalfa, and cotton plantations suffer from it to a greater extent. The main measures to combat the spread of reeds are drainage, repeated and deep tillage, drying up its upper horizons with a temporary cessation of irrigation, alternating the sowing of rice with irrigated crops.

Reed is a great décor element that gives the environment a touch of exoticism and some sophistication, so it is often a key elementwhen designing parks and gardens.

Common cane: medical applications

In addition to practical qualities, cane has a number of medicinal properties, which were the first to be identified by doctors of the East. In China, its rhizomes were considered an antidote for seafood and fish poisoning, used as an antiemetic and choleretic agent, and prescribed for colds and urinary tract diseases. Cane leaves contain vitamin C, starch, sugars, carotene and amino acids, while the stems are rich in cellulose.

In scientific domestic medicine, ordinary cane is not used. Herbalists of the Siberian lands recommend a decoction of its shoots for the treatment of cystitis, edema, colds, and prostate diseases. It shows its healing properties in combination with highlander bird and sorrel. An infusion of cane shoots is recommended for anemia, beriberi, and a general decline in physical strength. An alcohol tincture of the leaves has diuretic properties.

When dried, they are used to make powder, which is sprinkled on poorly healing ulcers and festering wounds. The mucous secretions of the stems are treated with insect bites. With intestinal and gastric diseases, cane is recommended in the diet as a component of dietary nutrition. In cases of poisoning, fresh reed ash is used as an antiemetic.

Blank

Young cane stems and leaves are harvested in May-June. Drying is requiredproduce in a ventilated room (in attics, under a canopy), where the raw materials are laid out in a thin layer and periodically turned over.

Reed rhizomes are taken from the bottom of the reservoir with pitchforks, rakes and other improvised tools. Then they are washed under cold water, small roots and aerial parts are cut off, dried in air for several hours, and then dried in ovens, ovens, dryers at a temperature of 55-60 degrees. Signs of well-dried raw materials are cracking with a crunch, a sweetish taste, and a pleasant smell. Dried rhizomes are stored for about 3 years, stems and leaves - 1 year.

Reed in cooking

Young cane stalks are edible and taste like asparagus. In famine years, they even had to stock up on cane, the flour from the rhizomes of which was mixed with the usual - a huge deficit in those terrible times. Rhizomes and young reed shoots are eaten raw, added to salads, marinated, baked; roasted in crushed form, brewed and drunk as a coffee substitute.

Special contraindications to the use of cane have not been identified. However, it is still not recommended to use large amounts of flour based on it in culinary products due to its high fiber content.

Reed is a plant that resists disease in its majority. The spider mite is the main pest that damages the stalk of the common reed when the latter grows in adverse conditions (low humidity and poorwatering).