Expert Tips and Flower Boosting Tricks for Shi Tong
An article that provides an in-depth introduction to the related topics of Shi Tong, a type of succulent plant. It covers personal experiences and flower promotion techniques for Shi Tong. Let's delve into the details.
Many friends have asked about the flowering of Shi Tong, and some enthusiasts are puzzled why their Shi Tong doesn't bloom. In fact, there can be many answers to this question. The flowers of Shi Tong plants are all yellow, but there are some differences between different varieties. However, they are all very large, usually larger than the ball itself, and as the ball grows, the flowers also get bigger. Therefore, flowering is a very energy and water-consuming process, which is not easy for the small-sized Shi Tong plants!
Shi Tong actually has an extremely strong "reproductive desire" (possibly related to its short lifespan), so it is very "sexually mature" and is a genus that flowers frequently and has a long flowering period, with "constant blooming." However, since it is a small species and can mature sexually in just 2 years, the balls are not that big, so it's hard to bloom! As a result, they have the ability to bloom but lack the strength required for flowering, so they simply produce fruit directly. Early Shi Tong plants were like this, with most of the first year of sexual maturity being fruitless and having very few seeds. With good care, they can truly bloom in the second year.
The second reason for not flowering is that although young Shi Tong plants (3-5 years old) have initially developed the ability to bloom, they don't store much nutrients because their original habitats can be very dry and sunny. Since flowering will cause a lot of water loss, they must carefully decide whether to bloom, making the requirements for flowering conditions very high! Even when they bloom, each flower's blooming period is very short, usually just an afternoon. Therefore, whether they can bloom also depends on luck!
Firstly, the ball must be healthy;
Secondly, from the early stage of bud formation to the full maturity of the flower bud, it must be a sunny day.
Thirdly, there must be plenty of sunshine at noon on the day of flowering, and the temperature should not be too low.
Fourthly, it should not be too dry—the plant must have a certain amount of stored water, and the humidity of the air should not be too low. Only when these four conditions are fully met can you see their flowers. However, as the Shi Tong ages and the ball grows larger, its ability to store water and nutrients gradually increases, making flowering easier and the conditions less stringent.
Only when every flower has the ability to bloom can Shi Tong be considered truly "adult," at which point they can truly achieve constant blooming!
Tips to promote flowering:
First, the more sunlight, the easier it is to bloom, so let them bask in the sun!
Second, keep the plants dry for a long time at the beginning of the flowering period (for Shi Tong in Wuhan, the flowering period is roughly from June to September each year), and then suddenly increase watering and fertilizing on a sunny day to give a shock treatment that can promote flowering (of course, if you're unlucky and the weather suddenly changes after the shock treatment, with a couple of days of cloudy and rainy weather, instead of getting a flower, you might end up with a pile of seed pods, and after a lot of nutrients are consumed, you might only see these seed pods mature throughout the flowering period without any flowers).
Third, you can add phosphorus fertilizer in winter and before the flowering period, and use an appropriate concentration of growth regulators before the flowering period, which can help promote flowering.
The above content shares the full text of the experiences and flower promotion tricks for Shi Tong, hoping it will be helpful to green plant enthusiasts!