Published: 10. 5. 2020 · Updated: 10. 5. 2020

Besides growing cut flowers, we also focus on growing eucalyptus, greenery is essential for bouquets. We start our eucalyptus from seeds every year, part goes into our bouquets and the rest goes to you as young plants. To ensure your eucalyptus thrives, we decided to write a short and as honest as possible guide.

Eucalyptus

The safest way to grow it is to keep your eucalyptus outside, on a terrace or balcony, and bring it inside (into a winter garden or cool hallway) as soon as there is a risk of frost.

We don't really recommend it as a houseplant. Only if you have a sunny apartment. It definitely won't thrive next to the TV where there is hardly any daylight, or next to a fireplace or other heat source.

Eucalyptus will form a lush bush and brighten up your summer terrace, however, don't expect it to replace a walnut tree in the yard. The eucalyptus we grow does not have a trained root system and will not become a massive tree. If you buy a small eucalyptus from us in May, it will look similar to the large one in August.

Which eucalyptus is this for you?

We would like to set expectations right from the start — eucalyptus is for advanced growers. If you are starting with eucalyptus, follow this guide; it will go smoothly through the summer, the eucalyptus will grow rapidly, and then suddenly everything will start to go wrong in early autumn... Even so, it will bring you joy during the summer, it will smell wonderful, and from time to time you can snip a sprig for a vase or dry it.

The eucalyptus that you can buy in our shop is in the form of a young plant. The small one is in a 7×7 (cm) pot, the large eucalyptus in a giant 25×25 (cm) pot. A small eucalyptus is 6+ months old, a large one 9+, and some even 14+ months old. On the farm, we grow eucalyptus as small bushes from which we harvest stems that we then use in arrangements; the bushes are ~ 1.8 m tall.

Life cycle

It will grow like crazy from May until September/October. It grows incredibly fast outside during the summer, doubling in size in a few months. As soon as autumn arrives, with shorter days, less light, and lower temperatures, the eucalyptus will stop growing.

Be prepared that it won't grow at all during the winter, not even a bit. It might survive, but you will more likely be diagnosing one problem after another — an edema from higher air humidity here, something drying out there; it's a depressing period, but don't worry, as soon as the days start getting longer and there is more light, the eucalyptus will come back to life, and you will see it sprouting new shoots. At that point, you are an advanced grower because you have succeeded in overwintering eucalyptus.

Even though we overwinter eucalyptus on the farm, we prefer to say it's advanced gardening, and you should rather prepare for a scenario where you fail to overwinter the eucalyptus. It might just dry out overnight. You almost won't notice it, and you won't even know what exactly caused it — whether you didn't water it enough or overwatered it. It just turns into a biscuit.

Step by step

Sunny, full sun, as much sun as possible. On our farm, we have eucalyptus in a field where the sun blazes all day, and we also have black fabric underneath to intensify it. So choose the sunniest spot you have in the garden for your eucalyptus.

As a potting substrate, you can use ordinary peat-based garden soil or ordinary soil you have in the garden. Mix the substrate with sand in a 1:4 ratio, i.e., one part sand, four parts soil. Sand ensures the substrate is well-drained and the eucalyptus won't rot.

We recommend gradually repotting the eucalyptus into a larger pot. If you order a small eucalyptus from us, it will arrive in a 7×7 (cm) pot. The first thing to do is repot it into a slightly larger pot. Do not repot it into giant containers immediately.

Reach for a pot one size larger, i.e., 9×9 (or 12×12 and similar). If you were to repot the eucalyptus into a huge pot right away, there is a risk that you would drown it when watering. For a better idea — on the farm, we start eucalyptus in trays (ø 3 cm), then we repot it into 7×7 pots, then we move it to 12×12, and only then does it reach the largest pot, which is 25×25. Every time we skipped a pot size, it caught up with us.

Before your eucalyptus gets strong, we recommend providing it with support. We use a bamboo stake to which we simply tie the eucalyptus.

Water the pot only when the substrate is completely dry. However, be careful; eucalyptus can barely survive 4-8 days of dryness before it won't recover. You need to balance watering well; the eucalyptus cannot stand in water, but it also won't survive in a completely dry substrate.

The best method is bottom watering — place the pot in a saucer. The plant will absorb only what it needs, and you can pour out any excess water from the saucer.

In the summer, we water the eucalyptus once a week with drip irrigation, where the water drips directly to the roots, allowing us to soak it for 1-2 hours. In the winter, when we overwinter the eucalyptus in our heated greenhouse, we reduce the frequency of watering and water approximately once every 2-4 weeks. Always check that it is not standing in water.

You can fertilize the eucalyptus from April to August, once a week is ideal.

Do not fertilize eucalyptus with nitrogen, but reach for a fertilizer with a predominance of potassium (K). From organic fertilizers, you can use, for example, ProKton or Free PK. For synthetic fertilizers, choose Kristalon Fruit and Flower, or any other fertilizer where K prevails in the composition. Kristalon Fruit and Flower has an NPK composition of 15-5-30, i.e., there is twice as much potassium (K).

Composition of fertilizers

Fertilizers always show the composition and ratio of NPK elements, N is nitrogen, P is phosphorus, K is potassium. The composition of a fertilizer may be stated as — "19-6-20", which means it contains 19 parts N, 6 parts P, 20 parts K. If you are looking for a fertilizer with an increased potassium content, the third number (K) should be twice as large as the remaining two (N and P). The mentioned Kristalon Fruit and Flower has twice as much potassium (K).