Takka Chantrye flower - home care

Takka Shantrye is an evergreen perennial plant with an exotic black flower. Its homeland is considered to be tropical countries in Southeast Asia. In Russia, it can only be cultivated in greenhouses or winter gardens. Although some growers claim that the takka plant takes root well in an apartment.

Description of the flower

The local population of Southeast Asia uses all parts of the plant:

leaves, inflorescences, fruits eats;
the stems are harvested for the manufacture of hats, fishing tackle;
rhizomes are crushed and taken as flour for baking bakery products, making medicines.

Takka Shantrye is an amazing plant that delights

For your information! This unusual plant is also called the black bat (Tacca Chantrieri). People call it a black lily, a cat's mustache, a black orchid, a devil's flower, a cobra. It belongs to endangered species, since it is very rare in the wild.

What does Takka Chantrieu look like?

Takka Chantrye is a herbaceous monocotyledonous flowering plant of the Dioskorean family of the genus Takka species of Takka Chantrye. It has large leaves with small folds in the lower part, located on high petioles (up to 43 cm). The leaves are dark green, egg-shaped or elliptical with a sharp tip. They grow from the rhizome.

Plant leaves

Tuberous and creeping rhizomes. Delicate roots lie in the upper soil layer.

The plant blooms about 20-25 shiny flowers of an unusual cupped shape, which are located on a long arrow (up to 63 cm). At first they are light green, then they turn dark red and purple-black. The flower is decorated with light green stamens. There are bracts, from 4 to 30 pcs. on each flower, they have a different shape and color, but most of them are threadlike in green-purple tones.

The fruit is a berry that has an oval, triangular shape up to 4 cm in size, the color range from green to dark purple. The dark brown bean-shaped seeds have a ribbed structure.

Note! The flower grows up to 1 m in height. The green takka can reach 3 m in height.

Black takka grows up to 1 m in height

Features of home care

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Takka is a flower that needs special care at home. The required temperature, high air humidity in the room where the plant is located should be maintained. It is important to water and sprinkle on time, transplant, monitor the condition and appearance of the flower.

For your information! Thanks to proper home care, the Chantrye black takka can bloom all year round, resting only in the winter months.

How to achieve this result?

The devil's flower can bloom all year round

Temperature

Maintaining the right temperature in the room is one of the main rules for caring for a plant. Takka is a flower that is very thermophilic. In spring and summer, it is necessary to maintain the temperature in the region of 25-30 ° С, and in winter - about 20 ° С. The plant does not like cold and drafts, but it needs fresh air.

Lighting

The second important principle for caring for a plant is considered to be the right lighting.The plant should not be in direct sunlight, but moderately bright diffused light is necessary for growth, lush flowering and full development of the flower.

Important! You should not move the pot from place to place, as it gets used to a certain location and, if the lighting changes, it may die or stop blooming.

Watering

From early spring to late autumn, Tacca black needs abundant watering. But you need to make sure that the top layer of the soil has time to dry out a little. In the cold season, you need to water the plant much less often. The soil should dry more than half. But overdrying, as well as overflowing, the plant cannot be.

Spraying

The plant should be sprayed 1-2 times a week. From time to time, the Chantrieu takku can be placed in the bathroom for a steam bath.

Note! Spraying can be replaced by placing a container with a flower on a pallet with wet expanded clay.

Humidity

An equally important point is the air humidity in the room. For a flower, 70% is considered the optimal indicator.

The bat loves bathing in the shower

Priming

The tacky soil should be breathable, loose. For planting a flower, a mixture of leafy earth and peat in equal proportions with the addition of sand and turf is suitable. You can add vermicompost (vernicompost) or humus to the soil. Perlite can be added instead of sand and turf.

Top dressing

From spring to mid-autumn, the plant needs to be fertilized, as it grows intensively at this time. You can use any mineral dressing, fertilizers for orchids are suitable.

During the period of vegetative growth, fertilizers with nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus are needed. During the period of active flowering, fertilizing with phosphorus will be the best option.

Features of winter care

In winter, it is time to rest, so the plant does not need abundant watering and fertilization. You also need to reduce the humidity of the air so as not to provoke the development of fungal diseases.

Pruning

The flower does not need pruning. Only dried parts of the plant or faded flowers need to be removed.

When and how it blooms

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In natural conditions, Chantrieu takka grows high in the mountains, in tropical climates it blooms from February to August.

The flower has no special properties to attract pollinators. But insects are attracted by the subtle smell of spoiled meat and the shine of a flower. Filamentous bracts serve as food for insects, and in large bracts you can wait out a thunderstorm or spend the night.

Takka flower exudes an unusual aroma

The flower has a bell-shaped or cupped shape. Bracts of various shapes are arranged in two circles.

Flowering period

At home, a takka flower can bloom for 8-9 months in a row if properly cared for.

Changes in care during flowering

During the flowering period, it is important to monitor the temperature and humidity in the room, watering and spraying often, avoiding drafts, and fertilizing every 10 days.

How takka Chantrieu reproduces

There are two ways to propagate the Tacca flower: seed and division of the rhizome. The first method is longer, the seeds can germinate both in a month under favorable conditions, and in nine months. Reproduction by dividing the rhizome is a little easier.

Germinating seeds

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First, the Tacca black seeds are left in warm water for 24 hours.

Important! To keep the water cool, keep a container with seeds on batteries or in a thermos.

You need to plant seeds in small containers. If the cups are large, a distance of 3 cm between seeds must be maintained. They can be planted in peat or loose soil. The landing should not be deep. It is enough to plant a few millimeters from the soil surface.

What does the seedling of an exotic plant look like?

The soil for planting takki must be sufficiently moist. On top of the container with the planted seeds, you need to mulch with moss. It is necessary to spray crops daily from a spray bottle.Keep the container under glass or foil.

Plant pots should be kept in a warm, humid environment. The optimum temperature regime is 25-28 ° C. Bottom heating can be used to maintain the desired temperature and accelerate plant growth.

When the seeds germinate, do not remove the glass or film cover. Seedlings need to be sprayed every day.

When the seedlings grow a little and get stronger, they need to be transplanted into large containers. The soil must contain at least 10% coarse sand or gravel.

For your information! In the natural environment, the takki fruit quickly rots, and the ants carry the seeds.

Rhizome division

Reproduction by dividing involves cutting the bush into full-fledged parts. This means that each must contain several leaves and a growing point. Separation points must be treated with fungicide or activated carbon. Each part should be planted in separate containers according to their size: large children in large pots, smaller ones in small ones.

Separation of the rhizome

Transfer

The plant should be transplanted every 2-3 years in the spring. Each time you transplant, you need to take a pot of a larger volume than the previous one. There should be a drainage layer at the bottom of the pot.

Important! The pot for Tacca black should not be deep, as the roots are located in the upper layers of the soil.

Diseases and pests

Takka is quite resistant to diseases and pests, but if not properly maintained, it can cause trouble. If the problem is not eliminated in time, the plant may die.

When the flower overflows, root rot may appear. In this case, the plant should be transplanted immediately, cutting off the rotten parts of the rhizome. The cut points must be treated with a fungicide, the container must be disinfected or replaced with a new one. The soil should be fresh, loose, breathable.

If a spider mite appears, the plant should be sprayed with an insecticide. This pest appears on flowers if there is not enough humid air in the room.

An exotic flower is rarely affected by pests

Signs and superstitions

Takka Shantrye is a very unusual plant that blooms for a relatively long time. The flower changes from a light shade of green to a deep purple, almost black color. In nature, only a few plants can boast of such a rare color scheme.

Many legends and stories are associated with the takka flower. This exotic plant is used for magic rituals and ceremonies, it is not for nothing that it is called the devil's flower.

Takka Shantrye is a beautiful plant that requires special care and attention. If you adhere to all the rules for keeping a flower, it will decorate any house or winter garden with a wonderful view and an unusual color palette. In addition, takku can be easily multiplied and increase your own collection of outlandish flora that are on the verge of extinction.