Growing phacelia as green manure and honey plant

The word phacelia means a bunch. The homeland of this plant is America. Growing phacelia gardeners practice in order to enrich the soil with nitrogen and potassium. This plant is often called green manure or green manure. Also, phacelia is an excellent honey plant and it is often grown near apiaries by beekeepers.

The honey collected from phacelia fields has a delicate smell and pleasant taste. It is light in color, with a green or blue tint. Phacelia seeds are very small, they are sown shallowly, embedded in the soil by 2-3 cm. For a more even sowing, the seeds can be pre-mixed with sand. Sowing can be carried out during the entire spring-summer season. Under favorable conditions, they emerge within 8 days, and in dry weather this process can take a couple of weeks. Flowering begins 6 weeks after germination.

Phacelia grows rapidly, is drought-resistant, blooms profusely and for a long time. Loosening and weeding is required only within two weeks after germination. Grows on any soil. Withstands the plant and frosts down to -5 degrees. If the cultivation of phacelia is carried out in order to improve the soil, like green manure, then it is sown as thick as possible so that more green mass is formed, and after three weeks of flowering or earlier, it is embedded in the soil, where it quickly decomposes. Many gardeners sow phacelia after harvesting every year, before winter it manages to grow, and in late autumn it is embedded in the soil.

When grown as a melliferous plant, it is recommended to sow it several times a season so that it blooms throughout the summer. On large farms, phacelia is also grown for livestock feed.