Phacelia and its species is the Crop with purple flowers. In some circles, it’s a plant with lavender-blue and fragrant flowers that people adore while in full bloom.
5 Best-Selling Phacelia Seeds
What Significance is Purple Color in Purple Flowers
Every color has a meaning that comes with it. No wonder, red rose and red everything is all over Valentine’s Day every year. Purple has its origins tied to royalty and ceremony; purple flowers represent dignity, pride, and success.
Whether displayed as a stand-alone or a mix and match with other flower colors, purple positions out boldly as a fresh hue, especially if the background is light. Catholic Christian believers have a deep resonance for purple signifying Nativity.
Purple is a color you’ll find on two flags of the entire globe, and those ar Nicaragua and Dominica.
The common names of Phacelia include:
- Lacy Phacelia,
- Valley Verzenice,
- Fiddleneck,
- Tansy Leaf or Tansy Phacelia,
- Lacy Scorpion Weed,
- Wild Heliotrope or the bee’s friend.
Care for Phacelia as a Garden Plant and a Honey Plant
Taking care of Lacy Phacelia in your garden may challenge you since it’s not a very common garden flower. But that should not be among the reasons to fall in love with it and let it don your garden with its purple flowers.
In most cases, you’ll find a lacy Phacelia growing between 1 to 3 feet (0.5-1 m.) high. Some unfamiliar eyes may mistake it for thistles.
It’s universal nature among wild plants suits it’s ecosystems by being and above average in nectar production. If you are a fan of bees and butterflies lingering over your garden, then Phacelia is a great plus.
Away from an ordinary eye, it helps in the pollination of plants. Phacelia helps pollinate both wild and those within your garden, owing to the massive attraction of pollinating insects.
In some circles, Phacelia and its purple flowers earn it the name – honey plant. If you happen to combine its love with that of beekeeping, you are in for increased yields from your hives.
Phacelia among the top 20 flowers known to help bees increase their honey output. Other in that category include:
- Sunflowers
- Goldenrods
- Coriander
- Coneflowers and
- Mint
Once Lacy Phacelia establishes the roots system composing of rhizomes, it multiples aggressively and also through seed production.
The species of the purple tansy wildflower blooms from April through May. Under wild habitats, you can locate them growing at the roadsides and ditches, or meadows flanked by grasses and shrubs. Those are good for your seeds.
It’s an excellent recommendation to domesticate the purple tansy wildflower in pots. It helps in controlling them since the heavy seeding can overwhelm your garden. Potting also enables you to change than within locations where you plan to help them optimize pollination of other plants. Another tip with potting also aligns with your watering efforts.
Phacelia, the plant with purple flowers, is a resilient plant by nature. It thrives well in sunny spots even while the soils on them may be poor and even rocky. If your soils in the garden happen to be heavily manured, you can opt to plant the Phacelia slightly away from the garden flower beds, and cleverly close to your beehives to conveniently help pollinate other garden flowers.
Economic Contributions of Phacelia
Most species of Phacelia are common in Europe, where they are done for helpful economic contributions.
Why Plant Phacelia?
One reason to plant this plant with purple flowers is the overall effect of soil improvement and conditioning.
The rooting systems of Phacelia are concentrating at the top two inches of the soil layers.
You won’t find its rooting system griping deeper than that, but it’s intensity in soil improvement narrows down to improving them towards crumbly structures.
Part of its massive effect owes from fast growth combining with lush nature. When it comes to mineral requirements, Phacelia roots absorb and consume any traces of extra nitrogen and calcium from their soils.
Aside from planting on pots, Phacelia flowers also do well in vineyards and on the edges of crop fields. Also, more benefits apart from being nectar-rich and great at driving pollination agents like the hoverflies, which feed on the aphid and other pest insects reducing their destructive effects.
Phacelia Forage Absorbs excess nitrogen and calcium in soils.
Phacelia species are non-leguminous plants and combine broad-leaves with fast growth. That’s what counts for their affinity for nitrates and calcium from the soils they grow on. Slightly above average, seeding produces excellent effects for the suppression of other weeds. And, the leafage is a unique way to feed humus into the soils for it to improve.
Water Retention And Soil Conditions Improvement effects of Phacelia
Soils retain water when the surface is covered from direct sunlight and rainfalls, which cause soil erosion. When Phacelia provides a cover combining dense shades, water retention improves, as soil moisture by shielding it from direct evaporation.
Soil microorganisms can thrive well, especially with cover from direct sunlight rays and improved soil air circulation aided by the roots.
Gardening Seed Rate for Phacelia
Before sowing Phacelia seeds, prepare your beds into fine soils.
Before sowing, ensure you are clear of your seasons:
- Make your choice for either the months of March-May or shift to September – October.
- Planting early in falls suits a higher germination percentage for most climatic conditions.
- The planting rate should be between 4 to 5 lb. per acre and maintain a depth range of 0.125″-0.25.” If your field has higher weed germinations, you may slightly increase the seed rate per acre to help suppress the weeds.
Soil Preferences for Phacelia Species
- Phacelia germination prefers soil warmth ranging 50 – 68°F.
- Soil PH range pH of 6.1 to 6.4 (slightly acidic) to very alkaline – ranges 8.6 to 9).
- It survives in extensive range soils composing clays, silts, sands, and loam soils with a low preference for low fertility levels.
Soil Management Notes
Farmers can allow Phacelia as a quickly growing plant to fill into the soil with green manures. It can grow well after initial harvest qualifying as a bonus to help cover and improve soil fertility and structures. One more point, Phacelia helps while it does not require covering the soil as a separate crop rotational plant for an entire season.
Seed Collection from Phacelia Plants
Farmers should collect mature seeds when they turn to a color that is between slight to moderate brown in appearance and reasonably hard. Phacelia seeds mature consistently across an entire plant. Sop collecting the whole plant once it’s ready is okay.
Phacelia Growing Guide
- Plant the phacelia in a place that has good drainage and full sun to partial afternoon shade.
- Phacelia seedling can tolerate light frost but when grown-up, plants can easily be damaged by a hard frost.
- When growing phacelia in your lawn, make sure that the soil is balanced with organic fertilizer before planting to have better results.
- When planting a phacelia plant make sure that the spacing is approximately 15cm row gap.
- Sow phacelia plant in spring while the soil is still cool.
- Make sure that you cover the phacelia seeds well as they need darkness to germinate.
- Phacelia can be pulled up and composted at any time. So you have to pull up individual plants grown for flowers before they shed seeds.
- Phacelia may occur some problems with pests and diseases but expect that plants can attract bees and other beneficial insects.
Conclusion
Growing Phacelia for the purple flowers remains an important activity. However, looking at the broader ecological and economic contributions it makes gives better perspectives for embarking on it.
Studies show that Phacelia species are a great deal to tap from their invasive and prolific growth. When they come to an ecosystem, the benefits tend to trickle back and forth. How? Soil preservation as a natural resource gets a raise, while soil fertility improves.
Overall, Phacelia helps improve and balance up the ecological distortions that other forms of life and exploitative human activities may have cost soil and its ecosystem.
From a broader perspective, pollination comes in as a pivotal contributor to the perpetuation of generations across the animal and plant kingdoms.
