Dzhuzgun is a real child of the desert. It grows in the hottest and sultry places of the planet, while maintaining a high decorative appearance, bright fragrant flowers and amazing fruits. In the culture of indigenous peoples, it has found wide application, as it is sometimes almost the main plant of the area.
Dzhuzgun plant: description
Under this name, the genus of branched perennial shrubs from the buckwheat family is combined. Translated from Latin, it combines the words "beautiful" and "internode", which essentially reflects the appearance of the plant. Among the people, dzhuzgun acquired a number of names, including firebox, haze, sour acid (due to the taste of shoots), tursuk, etc.
The size of the shrubs range from 0.4 to 7 meters, depending on the place of growth. So, near the occurrence of groundwater, some species grow like tree-like or multi-stemmed shrubs.
The plant has a lacy abundantly branched crown. The trunk and old branches become curved over time, the young shoots are twisty, long, jointed, the color is gray-green, and there are practically no leaves. The species is largely typical of a desert plant.
Dzhuzgun produces shoots every year, in bunches of sinuses of lignified branches, since in the autumn they almost die off. Leaves are inconspicuous, awl-shaped or needle-shaped, linear, 3-7 mm long, their base has a stem-wide bell, fall off early.
A powerful plant must have an appropriate root system. For juzgun, the surface type is more characteristic. The horizontally located lateral roots sprawl up to 20 m in length and 30 in depth in order to provide themselves with water.
Flowering juzguna
The plant develops very rapidly and at the age of 5-6 it already reaches the maximum sizes characteristic of the species. At the same age, one can observe the first flowering of a desert shrub.
It is nice to see how juzgun looks during flowering (from mid to late April). A tall shrub, with virtually no greenery, is covered with many single white, pink (sometimes with a purple hue) or green flowers. They have a pronounced aroma, axillary, regular shape, bisexual. After more than two weeks of flowering, ovaries form, in late May - early June, the formation of fruits begins. The vegetation process itself begins in the second half of March.
Fruiting
Juzgun fruit is a straight or twisted nut with a solid pericarp. A distinctive feature is that it is winged, or strewn with branchy or simple bristles. They are several times longer than the nut itself. Many plants of the desert possess such adaptations. In this regard, Dzhuzgun spreads well, since the seeds do not settle in the sand, but are easily carried by the wind over very long distances. However, due to the woody shell, their germination is not very good, but the ability to germinate is maintained for 5-9 years.
Habitat
Representatives of the genus Dzhuzgun are characterized by exceptional stability and the ability to survive in the most severe conditions. Often these are the only species from higher plants that grow in deserts scorched by the sun. The range of growth is vast: from the Sahara desert (North Africa) to Alashan and Ordos in China. An extensive genus with more than 150 representatives is found in Russia in Western Siberia.
Dzhuzgun (description above) feels good in the sand, withstanding falling asleep almost to the level of the peak and other extreme conditions. However, it is sensitive to spring frosts, at a temperature of 2-5 ° C, young shoots begin to blacken and dry out.
Types of Juzgun
As already mentioned, the vast genus includes more than 150 species of shrubs differing in appearance and size, flowers and fruits. Let us focus only on some, including those growing in Russia.
- Dzhuzgun tree-like - a shrub with a well-developed root system, reaches up to 3-3.5 m in height. One of the first plants, which is fixed on moving sands, is therefore used to strengthen the soil. It has high decorative properties and is used in tapeworms, group landings, at the edges, to create a hedge or protective strip.
- Dzhuzgun leafless - a shrub up to 2 m in height and long horizontal roots (up to 12 m), which allows it to be used as a soil-strengthening plant. It grows on clay, sandy soils, solonetzes, and solonchaks of some species. It is found in Russia in the south of the lower Volga region, Ciscaucasia and Transcaucasia. It is widely used (for food, for firewood, as animal feed) in the indigenous steppe peoples.
- Juzgong is tall. This is a small tree (up to 7 m) with a slender trunk and a sparse crown, or a weakly branched shrub. Few people know that the plants of the Juzgun desert can also be decorative. This species has white bark and large flowers.
- Dzhuzgun "head of a jellyfish" is a highly branched, fast-growing shrub up to 2 m high. The most unusual of all members of the genus, it has bright and fragrant flowers, has fruits of a rich red or green hue. Used in group plantings, tapeworms, hedges.
