Lotus, one of the top ten famous flowers in China, is not only colorful and fragrant, but also has strong adaptability. It can be widely planted in lakes, spectacular, potted and potted, and has a special taste. Since ancient times, the precious aquatic flowers in palace gardens and private gardens are increasingly favored by people and widely used in today's modern landscape gardens. Recently, there are three kinds of special lotus gardens in China: one is the Garden Botanical Garden in Moshan, East Lake, Wuhan, where a large aquatic flower area is opened to watch and study lotus flowers; First, large parks such as Mochou Lake in Nanjing and the new "Quyuan Fenghe" in Hangzhou are mainly for lotus appreciation; Another kind is the lotus folk tourism resources scenic spot, which is mainly based on wild interest and combined with tourism, such as Lotus World in Sanshui, Guangdong Province and Tuanhu Scenic Spot in Yueyang, Hunan Province.
2. Waterscape plants as the theme in landscape gardens: As the saying goes, "A garden is not strong without mountains, and mountains are not beautiful without water". It is very common to decorate waterscape with lotus flowers in China gardens. There are many famous gardens in the south of the Yangtze River with buildings to appreciate the lotus scenery. The Slender West Lake in Yangzhou has a "Lotus Bridge" on its embankment. The jade pavilions on the bridge are strewn at random, with simple and elegant shapes, exquisite and unique, which are in harmony with the lotus flowers in the lake. It is the best place in the scenery of Slender West Lake. The Lotus Square in Yueyang Golden Jubilee Park is built near the water, which is connected with the winding fence, fragrant with cattails and enjoying the lotus in the rain, and is deeply loved by the masses.
3. Make summer flowers among the flowers that can be enjoyed in four seasons: the different landscapes in four seasons are the gardening rules that China gardeners abide by, such as plum blossoms resisting winter, willows welcoming spring, green lotus relieving summer, and tung leaves shocking autumn. The green viewing period of lotus is as long as 8 months, and the group flowering period is about 2~3 months. In summer and autumn, people lack cicadas, peaches and plums are speechless, and the graceful lotus flowers exude a refreshing fragrance in a clear water, which makes people feel relaxed and happy.
4. Foreground, middle scene and main scene in multi-level arrangement: China gardens pay great attention to the change of levels when arranging plants, so as to form rich landscapes with different distances and heights. The combination of willow and lotus is a typical technique. Liu E once used "lotus flowers on four sides and willow trees on three sides, a city with mountains and mountains and half a city with lakes" to summarize Daming Lake in Jinan. In the Yuhu Park in Xiangtan, Hunan Province, catkins are flying in spring, and Xiaohe is pointed; In summer and autumn, the flowers and leaves are graceful and the willows are green; In winter, willow silk batch of snow, residual lotus sound, can yet be regarded as a beautiful scenic spot.
5. As a "filter" in the waters polluted by industrial wastes, the underground stems of lotus root can absorb the products of aerobic microorganisms decomposing pollutants in the water, so lotus can help the polluted waters to restore the food chain structure and promote the water ecosystem to gradually realize a virtuous circle.
Lotus has a strong adaptability to the growing environment. It can not only bloom in lakes and ponds, but also be graceful and decorate the world even in small pots and bowls. In the history of Dutch culture in China, the form of basin lotus was only used for private courtyard viewing at the beginning. Nowadays, pot lotus is widely used in gardens all over China. The combination of potted plants and pond planting improves the ornamental value of potted lotus, which often appears in garden waterscapes and garden sketches. Lotus waterstone bonsai is a new kind of bonsai that appeared in Hangzhou in recent years. It is an organic combination of lotus potted plants and waterstone potted plants, which not only reflects the firmness and straightness of rocks, but also shows the delicate and charming lotus flowers. Lotus bonsai can choose coral stone, sand stone, axe stone, English stone and other rocks as materials.
flower arrangement in China began in the Six Dynasties, and originated from offering flowers before the Buddha. As a holy flower of Buddhism, it can be said that flower arrangement is convenient for lotus to form an indissoluble bond when it rises. During the Tang and Song Dynasties, offering flowers was still a major form of flower arrangement. By the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the art of flower arrangement had made great progress. At this time, the depth and skill of lotus flower arrangement rose to a new level, which can be called the heyday of ancient Chinese flower arrangement art. Today, people have made more in-depth research on lotus flower arrangement. Not only the materials such as lotus, lotus leaf, lotus root and lotus fruit are more and more widely used in flower arrangement, but also the ornamental effects of these materials are scientifically compared. Small and medium-sized varieties are generally suitable for lotus flower arrangement, and branches, leaves and fruits of other plants are also properly matched, so as to strive for bright colors and bright composition, and the appreciation effect can be maintained for 3-4 days < P >. The rhizome (lotus root) is thick and knotty, and it is born in the bottom mud. The leaves are shield-shaped and round, the surface is dark green, and the back is gray-green with waxy white powder, and the whole edge is wavy. Petiole cylindrical, densely barbed. Flowers are solitary at the top of pedicel and above the water level, and there are single petals, compound petals, double petals and heavy platforms. The colors are white, pink, crimson, lavender or intermediate color; Stamens are numerous; The pistil is free and buried in the inverted conical sponge receptacle, and there are many scattered honeycomb holes on the surface of the receptacle. After fertilization, it gradually expands and is called lotus, and a small nut (lotus seed) is born in each hole. The flowering period is from June to September, and it opens and closes every morning. The fruit ripening period is from September to October. The roots of lotus are planted on the mud at the bottom of ponds or rivers, while the lotus leaves stand out of the water. There are flowers on the stems that protrude a few centimeters from the water. Lotus flowers generally grow to 15 cm high and extend to 3 meters horizontally. The maximum diameter of lotus leaf is 6 cm. The eye-catching lotus can reach a maximum diameter of 2 cm.
Lotus is a dicotyledonous plant, Ranunculaceae Nelumbo, which includes two species, Chinese lotus and American lotus. Chinese lotus is distributed in Asia and Oceania, and most of them are tall, with oval and green leaves. Among the cultivated varieties, there are single petals, compound petals, double petals, heavy platform and thousand petals, and the flowers are red to white. American lotus is distributed in North America. Its plants are short, its leaves are nearly round and dark green, and its flowers are only single-petaled and yellow. It is still in a semi-wild state. According to the fossils studied by paleobotanists, as early as 135 million years ago, lotus plants were distributed in many water areas in the northern hemisphere. In China, the site of Hemudu Culture, discovered in 1973, contains lotus pollen fossils, which are determined to be 7 years ago. This shows that at least 7 years ago, lotus was distributed in China and even used as food. Although some information today indicates that the lotus originated in India, according to historical data, China is the origin of the lotus. Lotus has a long history of cultivation in China and has a wide spread. It reaches the northern foot of Tianshan Mountain in the west, Taiwan Province Island in the east, Heilongjiang in the north and Sanya in Hainan in the south. It can be said that China is the world cultivation center of lotus.
Lotus is one of the oldest dicotyledonous plants, and it also has some characteristics of monocotyledonous plants. The embryo of lotus is wrapped in scales, which is similar to monocotyledonous plants. From the flower structure, the lotus has 3 or 4 layers of perianth, sepals in the outer wheel, petals in the inner wheel, many stamens, free pistils, and single-channel boat-shaped pollen grains. The stem of lotus has obvious segmentation phenomenon, and the underground stem nodes are covered with fibrous roots. These are the characteristics of monocotyledonous plants. The buds of lotus are mixed buds, and the lotus buds seen by people with naked eyes are the terminal buds of lotus root and the positions of axillary buds of each node. Roots are divided into seed roots and adventitious roots. The main roots formed by the radicle of seeds are underdeveloped, and the adventitious roots play a functional role. As for the stem of lotus, it is known as lotus root, which is actually the underground rhizome of lotus, and it is the organ for storing nutrients and breeding. The flower of the lotus is solitary and bisexual, which consists of six parts: calyx, corolla, stamen group, pistil group, receptacle and flower stalk. Variety, rich colors.
There are three kinds of leaves: the leaves first produced by the terminal buds, which are small in shape and thin in handle and float on the water, and are called money leaves, or money-bearing leaves; The leaves that first grew from the lotus roots were slightly larger and also floated on the water, called floating leaves; Later, the leaves that stood out of the water from the lotus roots were called vertical leaves. No matter whether it is a money leaf, a floating leaf or a vertical leaf, it is rolled into a ribbed strip before coming out of the water. The size, height and order of vertical leaves show obvious ascending and descending steps according to the growth time. When the new lotus root is formed, the erect leaf that is pulled out is larger than the previous one, and just pricked shorter, which is called "back handle leaf". In front of it, a leaf with small shape, short stalk and reddish back appears, which is called "termination leaf". People can find the position of the new lotus root in the mud only by identifying the terminal leaves.
The flower primordium of lotus is planted in the bud at the lotus root zone and on the back of the base of young leaves; Flowers are solitary and bisexual; Sepals 4~5, green, fall off after flowering; The battalion commander is peach-shaped, peach-shaped or round-peach-shaped, dark purple or grayish green; Flowers can be divided into single petals, compound petals, heavy petals and thousand petals, and the colors are crimson, pink, white, tan green and intermediate colors. The flowering period is from June to September, and the single flowering period is only 3-4 days, and most of them are closed at noon, and thousands of petals can bloom for more than 1 days; The maximum flower diameter can reach 3 cm, and the smallest one is less than 1 cm; Stamens are 6~45 or petaloid, and the debris of anthers is mostly yellow and the filaments are white; The school head is born, the ovary is superior, and the carpels are mostly separated, scattered in the bowl-shaped and trumpet-shaped green receptacle. The swollen receptacle after flower withering is called lotus, and there are 3-3 lotus cells on it. When it develops normally, each carpel forms an oval nut. Sometimes carpels "bubble" or petaloid, and cannot form fruits. The fruit, commonly known as lotus seed, has a turquoise skin when it is green and turns dark blue when it is ripe. There are stomata and guard cells on the surface of the pericarp, solid and dense palisade tissue under the epidermis, and a stomatal channel under the stomata. The stomatal channel of the mature lotus seed pericarp is very small, which prevents air and water from entering and leaving freely, and even prevents microorganisms from entering. This special organizational structure ensures the longevity of lotus seeds. It can be buried in the stratum for thousands of years without damage, and can even be used for sowing and germination.
Junzihua, Lingbo Fairy, Shuigong Fairy, Yuhuan, etc. According to "The Story of a Dream in the North", Su Changyuan lived in Wuzhong (now Suzhou) during the Yuanhe period of the Tang Dynasty (86~82), and met a pink-faced girl from plain clothes and gave him a jade ring. Soon, he found that there was a lotus flower in the pool of his courtyard, and there was also a jade ring in the stamen, but it was "absolutely broken", so later generations called it the jade ring.
lotus is called "living fossil" and is one of the earliest plants in angiosperms.
before human beings appeared, about 14,5 years ago, most of the earth was covered by oceans, lakes and swamps. At that time, the climate was bad, disasters were frequent, there were no animals, most plants were eliminated, and only a few wild plants with strong vitality grew on this barren earth. Among them, there is an aquatic plant that we call "Lotus" today, which has withstood the test of nature and survived tenaciously in amur river (now Heilongjiang), the Yellow River, the Yangtze River basin and the swamp lakes in the northern hemisphere. After about nine thousand years, primitive humans began to appear. In order to survive, human beings collect wild fruits to satisfy their hunger, and soon find that the wild fruits and root nodes (namely lotus seeds and lotus roots) of this "lotus" are not only edible, but also sweet and fragrant, and delicious. Gradually, "Lotus", the food source of human survival, was deeply imprinted in the hearts of our ancestors, primitive humans, and became a symbol of human survival.
Until the Neolithic Age in 5-6 BC, with the emergence of farming culture, people began to know more about lotus. At that time, in order to meet the demand for water in life, human beings generally settled in banks and lakes or marshes with natural springs, and these areas were just the main distribution areas of wild lotus flowers. From the unearthed cultural relics, it is found that there are carbonized grain and two lotus seeds on the indoor table in the site of "Yangshao Culture" excavated in Dahe Village, northern Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, which has a history of 5, years. In the continuous productive labor, human beings have accumulated rich perceptual knowledge about the growth habits and living environment of lotus flowers, which has laid a good foundation for the emergence and development of the ancient paste flower culture in China.
before Qin and Han dynasties, the warlord regime was divided, wars were frequent, and working lives were in dire straits. Qin Shihuang unified China in 221 BC, ending the melee. In this unified empire, lotus culture has been fully developed and gradually penetrated into agriculture, economy, medicine, religion, art and other fields.
The Han Dynasty was a period of unprecedented agricultural development in China, and it also played an important role in the cultivation and development of lotus. Before the Han Dynasty, all lotus varieties in China were single-petaled red lotus. In the Wei and Jin Dynasties, a double-petal lotus appeared. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, there were thousands of lotus petals.
Since the Western Han Dynasty, the official and private businesses in China have developed rapidly, enriching the variety of goods in various regions, which is of great significance to the spread and distribution of lotus flowers. Lotus root, a specialty of Jiangling, Hefei, Chengdu and other places, has entered the north through these central markets, which has fundamentally expanded the distribution area of lotus, enabled people in the north to further understand lotus and understand lotus, thus greatly improving the cultivation skills of lotus. In Qi Min Yao Shu written by Jia Sixie in the Northern Wei Dynasty, there is a "method of planting lotus roots": "In the early spring, the lotus roots were dug and planted in the mud of the fish pond, and then there were lotus flowers." ; There is also a method of "planting lotus seeds": "On August 9th, if the lotus seeds are hard and dark, grind the lotus heads on the tiles to make the skin thin, and seal them with cooked mud, such as three fingers long and two inches long, so that the lotus heads are ground off sharply, and the mud is dry and thrown under the heavy mud in the pool. The skin is naturally thin and easy to grow, and it will come out soon. If it is not ground, the skin will be hard and thick. It can be seen that the cultivation technology of lotus in the Central Plains on both sides of the North and South was quite superb at that time.
Chinese medicine has started new development since Qin and Han dynasties. After tasting all kinds of herbs in Han Dynasty, Shennong summed up a set of good prescriptions for treating diseases, namely "Herbal Classic", also known as "Shennong Herbal Classic", in which the medicinal and health care functions of lotus root were described. Hua Tuo, Qiaoxian County in the Eastern Han Dynasty, is a famous imperial doctor in the medical history of China. Before the operation, he first gave the patient hemp boiling powder to make him unconscious, cut the back of his abdomen and sewed up the wound, and finally applied a plaster made of lotus root skin, which could heal in four or five days. Lotus has become a rare flower in China's medical treasure house.
during the western Han dynasty, Yuefu songs gradually became popular, which produced many beautiful lotus picking ballads. Among them, Lotus Picking Song (also known as Lotus Pickers and Lotus Pickers by the Lake) and so on, the dancers are dressed in red, wearing faint skirts, riding lotus boats, holding lotus flowers, singing and dancing, and are full of strong life breath, which is one of the most popular traditional folk songs and dances in China.
< Fourth > Prosperity of Lotus Culture-Lotus Culture from Sui and Tang Dynasties to Ming and Qing Dynasties
After Sui and Tang Dynasties, the cultivation techniques of lotus were further improved, and the lotus culture contents such as poems, paintings, sculptures and crafts were more colorful. In food culture, lotus has further become a valuable tonic for people's health care. At the same time, lotus has entered private gardens with its colorful and graceful appearance. For example, in the southeast corner outside Chang 'an, there was Yichun Garden in Qin and Han Dynasties, and after the Sui Dynasty established Chang 'an as its capital, it was renamed Furong Garden. The wind and lotus of the Quyuan in Lin 'an (now Hangzhou), the capital of the Southern Song Dynasty. Especially after the rule of Zhenguan, the application of lotus has become more and more extensive, and it has become the source of inspiration for arts and crafts artists. For example, porcelain and bronze mirrors in Sui and Tang Dynasties were decorated with lotus patterns. The gold and silver vessels, especially the edge of the plate, are decorated with rich lotus petals, and the whole style is gorgeous and true. The dyeing and spinning industry in Song Dynasty had a higher development than that in Tang Dynasty. Kerou Zhu, a famous female painter and worker, created the lotus silk reeling pattern, which is "ancient and elegant" and is a must for the time being.