Rhubarb

These are very large perennial grasses with thick, woody, branched rhizomes .

Elevated stalks are annual, straight, thick, hollow, and sometimes weakly furrowed.

Basal leaves are very large, long-petiolate, whole, palmate-lobed or toothed, sometimes wavy along the edge; scapes cylindrical or multifaceted, at the base provided with large sockets . Stem leaves are smaller.

The stem ends in a large paniculate inflorescence .

The flowers are mostly white or greenish, rarely pink or blood-red; they are bisexual or due to underdevelopment - same-sex. The perianth is simple, six-leaved, the leaves of which are either all the same, or the outer ones are somewhat smaller than the inner ones; the perianth fades after pollination. Stamens 9, in two circles, with the outer circle doubled; only Rheum nobile Hr. six stamens, since the outer circle is not doubled. The pistil is one, from the upper one-triangular ovary ; there are three columns , with capitate-reniform or horseshoe stigmas .

The fruit is a triangular wide-or narrow-winged nutlet . The seed is proteinaceous, the embryo is central.

Propagated by seeds; in culture, by dividing an adult plant so that each part of the root has a bud (eye); the latter method rather gives large leaves.

Rhubarb is widespread in Asia from Siberia to the Himalayan mountains and Israel , and is also grown in Europe .

All types of rhubarb, there are more than twenty. Species are highly prone to produce fruit-bearing hybrids , and the latter are just as easy to make hybrids between themselves, so it is difficult to obtain pure species from seeds ; in general, determining the types of rhubarb is not easy.

• Rhubarb ( Rheum officinale Baill. ), A huge herb that grows wild in Eastern Tibet and is often bred as a medical plant . Stems up to 2 m tall and leaves up to 1.25 m in length; plate cordate ovoid, acuminate, five- or seven-palatine-lobed.
• Palate rhubarb ( Rheum palmatum L. ), grass with stems 1.5 m tall and leaves rounded-ovate, palmately lobed. Wildly grows in Central Asia . In Europe, it is often bred in gardens .
• Southern Rhubarb ( Rheum australe D.Don ) and others are bred in the gardens.

In garden culture there are several types:

• Rhubarb hybrid ( Rheum × hybridum Murray ),
• Wavy rhubarb ( Rheum rhabarbarum L. ) and others.

They are eaten by man as a vegetable (when cultured, they tend to expel possibly large leaves, as the leaf stalks instead of spinach are eaten, as well as compote , jam, and fillings in sweet pies ). Vegetable species differ from medical ones in appearance: in the former, the leaves are entire, in the latter, the palmate-carved or lobed.

• Black Sea Rhubarb ( Rheum rhaponticum L. ) is used in veterinary medicine .
• Noble Rhubarb ( Rheum nobile )
• Tartar rhubarb ( Rheum tataricum )
• Rhubarb Emodi ( Rheum emodii )
• Southern Rhubarb ( Rheum australe )
• Rhubarb compact ( Rheum compactum L. )
• Wittrock Rhubarb ( Rheum wittrockii Lundstr. )
• Currant Rhubarb ( Rheum ribes L. )
• Rocky Rhubarb ( Rheum rupestre )
• Reven Maximovich ( Rheum maximowiczii Losinsk. )
• Goblin Rhubarb ( Rheum nanum Sievers )

Rhubarb culture is most common in England and the USA . Of the cultivated varieties most favorite: giant, Victoria, royal and early red, or Tobolsk; the first two are suitable only because they rarely bloom (flowering stops the growth of leaves). The rhubarb tolerates the climate of Russia quite well and in most cases winters without a tire; only the most tender varieties of it in the more northern strip of Russia require protection from frost in the form of an earth mound and a layer of straw or leaves above the heads of the roots. Rhubarb loves fresh, deep, rich soil with an impermeable subsoil (deep black-earth loams are most suitable).

Seeds are sown in early spring on an ordinary ridge with loose soil, then the seedlings are transplanted with a pick at a distance of 25-35 cm; in the fall or, better, in spring, the seedlings are planted in a permanent place - at a distance of 70 cm. Sowing of shoots is carried out either in October or in early spring. Planted with seeds or shoots, the soil is pre-deeply treated, mixed with decomposed manure or compost . Fertilizer is generally every year in the fall - after collecting the leaves or after 2-3 years, increasing the amount of fertilizer . In spring and summer - along with a shelf of weeds - the soil is loosening - hoeing. Rhubarb of early forcing is bred in greenhouses and on steam ridges or on heaps - round, in the form of a truncated cone 70 cm high with a diameter of the upper platform of 35 cm; in this case, landing is done in the fall; for the winter, a pile is covered with a thick layer of manure, which is replaced by fresh in early spring, after frosts - by a layer of leaves. The collection of leaves (by cutting off or breaking off) is carried out in most cases only from the second year within 4-10 years. So that the plant is not depleted, the leaves are gradually removed - over the course of the summer and, moreover, only fully developed. Flower stalks are immediately cut off so that they do not inhibit leaf growth. If they want to get seeds, they leave only one flower stalk, otherwise the seeds will come out thin.

Such types of rhubarb as wavy, compact, Vittrok, currant and others are eaten ^[4] .

From the cut leaves, the plates go to forage for pigs or compost , while the petioles, bundled, are sold. In order to obtain tender petioles, the plant is somewhat tucked up and surrounded by a keg without a bottom or a pot (English method): the shaded petioles are drawn to the light, drawn out and acquire a certain tenderness. Fresh petioles to remove dense skin are cut into pieces and consumed:

• boiled in sugar syrup, give sourish, very tasty jam
• slightly boiled in a thick sugar syrup, dried and the next day again submerged in syrup give rhubarb
• scalded with boiling water, rubbed through a sieve and boiled with sugar go as a filling in sweet pies, reminiscent of apple sauce in taste
• from the juice of petioles they prepare a wine like Chablis , and the juice, mixed with water and sugar, is first fermented; when the last is over, and the liquid is enlightened, it is filtered, defended and bottled, which is kept for at least a year in the basement.

Root harvesting - for medical purposes - is done no earlier than the fourth year since their full ripeness; The best harvesting time is autumn in the sixth year. After clearing the roots and roots of the roots and cutting them into pieces, they are dried in the sun and then, when the roots harden, strung on strings and dried in the shade. Petioles should be immediately marketed , but the roots can be stored for a long time in a dry place.

In medicine, the root of certain types of rhubarb is used. Inside the root has reddish, yellow and white veins or stripes; the taste is bitter, the smell is peculiar. Rhubarb contains a reddish, bitter-tasting glycoside chrysophane — a powder that gives dark water with alkalis and a cherry red solution with alkali , chrysophonic acid (dioxymethyl anthraquinone) that crystallizes as golden-yellow needles or rhombic plates, odorless and tasteless, it is difficult to dissolve in cold, easier - in hot water, alcohol , ether and easily in alkalis; In addition, it contains various resins , starch , tannins and oxalic acid . It is used in small doses as a means of stimulating appetite and improves digestion .

Appointed in powder , tablets or pills , very rarely in the broth ; in doses of 0.1-0.5 g - as a means of promoting digestion, from 1 to 5 g - as a laxative . Other preparations are also prepared from the root; extract by 0.1-0.4 - as a stomach and by 0.5-2.0 - as a laxative; complex extract ( sobur , jalapa , medical soap and alcohol ) is taken in the same doses; water and alcohol extracts are appointed by teaspoons; baby powder (with magnesia ) from ¼ to a whole teaspoon several times a day and syrup in the same doses.

• Sergey Rodimov. Imperial monopoly on rhubarb // CM Number one: the newspaper. - 2004. - No. of July 15, 2004 . (not available link) Verified November 24, 2008
• Tatyana Kazakova. Heroic grass. The magazine "Gardener" № 6, 2007

• Rhubarb (English) : information on the site GRIN . (eng.) Checked November 24, 2008
• Rhubarb (Eng.) Information on the Encyclopedia of Life (EOL) website (Retrieved June 16, 2010) .
• Rhubarb - an article from the Great Soviet Encyclopedia .
• Rhubarb // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : 86 t. (82 t. And 4 extra.). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
• Rhubarb on the USDA NRCS website (English) Retrieved November 24, 2008