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Many gardeners who are engaged in growing vegetable crops indispensable for the diet of every person, of course, are concerned about the question – how to prepare potatoes for planting? After all, there are no trifles in such an important matter – it is necessary to prepare the tubers for planting in the ground in a timely manner, having gone through all the mandatory stages of their preparation for further growth and development, in order to then get a rich harvest of your favorite root crop.
When to cook tubers
When should you start preparing the tubers for planting in the soil? Before this, about a month before planting the seed material in the ground, it is necessary to lay out the tubers for germination. Over a long period of time, they are able to lose a lot of energy and strength necessary in order to germinate. In order to germinate properly, seeds should be checked for unwanted diseases. In order for the tubers to wake up, they should be placed in a room for several days, the temperature in which will be about 20 – 22 degrees, and later they need to be moved to a cooler place (about 10 – 14 degrees).
An important condition is the presence of a sufficient amount of light in the room. In the event that the sprouts after that are more than 5 cm, they need to be broken off, and new ones will certainly appear in their place. Immediately before planting in the soil, the tubers should acquire a dark green color. If your tubers are too large, you can cut them in half before planting in the ground. At the same time, there should be sprouts on both halves of the tubers.
Also, before planting potatoes in the soil, the tubers need to be processed using for this purpose special modern preparations to protect vegetable crops from bacterial and fungal infections – such as Maxim, Bordeaux liquid, copper oxychloride. This is done correctly like this – the tubers should be soaked for half an hour a day before planting them in the soil in the selected product, placed in a container, strictly following the instructions. Germination of tubers today is much more efficient than growing planting material from seeds.
What is it for
Many novice gardeners are wondering – is the process of preparing seed material for planting in the soil so important? Experts and summer residents with experience unanimously argue that it is necessary to prepare potatoes for the upcoming spring planting. Since, provided that the preparation is carried out correctly and on time, the necessary biological mechanism is launched in the tubers, which is directly related to the formation of viable sprouts in the future and the excellent development of the root system of the vegetable crop. This preparatory program gives you a unique opportunity after planting in the ground to expect earlier shoots than if you use unprepared material for this purpose.
Also at the preparatory stage, it is possible to select bad tubers – sick, damaged, and the like – which are better not to be used for planting if you want to get a high-quality and rich harvest. Also in the process, it is possible to reject those potatoes on which rot is visually visible, eyes have not woken up, too weak sprouts have formed. Thus, only good and full of strength planting material is selected.
Program
When choosing a method for preparing potato tubers for planting in the soil, it is necessary to proceed from your own capabilities and conditions – for example, if the planting material was purchased late, then it is not possible to germinate it, since there simply will not be enough time left for this.
Video “Preparing for landing”
Germination
Sprouting has been considered the most effective method for many years. This classic method makes it possible to get strong, viable sprouts that make excellent potatoes. Depending on the conditions offered to the tubers, there is dry and wet germination. Dry is carried out in the range of 20 to 40 days in the presence of sufficient light and a certain temperature. At the same time, the color of the sprouts can be different, which largely depends on the variety of potatoes. In the presence of light in the right doses, the planting potatoes turn green, which is very important for them to acquire stable immunity against a number of diseases. To ensure uniform lighting, the tubers should be laid out in a single layer in boxes. It is permissible to use nets or transparent polyethylene bags, but it is imperative to make holes in them for oxygen access. The temperature in the first week and a half should be about 18 – 20 degrees, after which it can be reduced to 10 – 14.
With wet germination of tubers, before planting in the soil, sawdust, peat or humus should be poured into the placement boxes. Such containers must be kept in a dark room, maintaining a temperature there of about 12 – 15 degrees. At the same time, tubers in a moist substrate can form not only sprouts, but also a strong root system, while they will lose less liquid and substances useful for the plant. Combined germination is also used – they combine the dry and wet methods. To do this, the tubers are first germinated for about three weeks in the light, after which they are placed in a moist substrate for another one and a half weeks, so that high-quality roots can form in the sprouts that appear after the first stage.
withering
This method is usually used in order to awaken the eyes of potatoes and make the process of sprouts appear as quickly as possible. In order to carry out wilting, heat with a temperature above 16 degrees is required. Although the presence of light is not necessary, nevertheless, with it, the planting material is able to acquire a strong immunity to various kinds of ailments that lie in wait for vegetable crops at every step. Drying is well suited when it is necessary to germinate potatoes as soon as possible. To do this, the potatoes are laid out in a single layer and kept warm until the rudiments of the first sprouts appear – most often this takes from one to several weeks. At the same time, the planting material is able to lose a certain amount of fluid, but it gains enzymes that will help it awaken its eyes faster and accelerate the growth of vegetable shoots.
Warming up
If you plant potatoes, which you got cold from a cellar or a special pit, into the ground without prior preparation, then you will have to wait a very long time for seedlings to appear. To quickly prepare potatoes for planting, provided that you did not have time to germinate them, you can warm them up three days before planting. You should not use too high a temperature for reheating, as this may adversely affect the quality and taste of your potatoes later. The optimal indicator is considered to be 20 – 22 degrees, which should be in the room where the root crop is placed, extracted from the cold cellar, immediately before planting in the ground. At the same time, for better adaptation of potatoes, you first need to place it at a temperature of about 10 – 15 degrees, and then already at 20 – 22.
Another important nuance is that if your potatoes were stored in a well-equipped storage, then the temperature there was kept at a level close to natural. That is, the dormant period of the root crop, in principle, has not yet ended. Since the chilled vegetable was perfectly stored due to the slowdown of natural physiological processes, it cannot be planted immediately. The tubers should be awakened beforehand, for which they are also placed in a warm place. But at the same time, the temperature must be raised very carefully and gradually, since its sharp jump can cause unwanted stress in the root crop.
Seedling
A great way to get a good harvest is the well-known seedlings. To do this, a layer of sawdust is placed in the boxes, after which the tubers are laid out, covered with another layer of sawdust (no more than three cm) on top, and watered regularly.
Instead of sawdust, it is quite acceptable to take peat or vermiculite. But if the seedlings are planted along with ordinary tubers, then the sprouts may be threatened with death from the first frost. Therefore, the seedling method is usually used infrequently, only in order to get an early potato harvest. During frosts, fragile shoots must be covered with dense non-woven material. For growing seedlings, it is recommended to take only those potato varieties that have an early ripening period.
Sometimes potato tubers can start sprouting on their own. At the same time, excessively large sprouts should not be allowed to appear, since they not only take a lot of the necessary vitality from the planting material, but are also capable of breaking during planting. You can simply break out such untimely sprouts, so you delay the germination of potatoes for the right time. And you can use unexpectedly grown shoots as seedlings. Because when a sprout reaches 4 to 6 cm in length, it already has the makings of its own roots.
This allows you to separate it from the tuber and produce wet germination in pre-prepared peat, soil mixtures, even sawdust is suitable for these purposes. The sprout will need to be placed in a container with this filling by about two-thirds. The tubers that remain will be able to sprout again over time, and from the seedlings we will also get excellent planting material. This option is also used by experienced gardeners if there are not enough planting tubers.
Since our people are very resourceful, in the absence of the necessary amount of material for planting – we are talking about tubers, not seeds – experienced gardeners sometimes use the cut tops of potatoes. For five days, they must be kept at room temperature, during which the cut point is dried, which prevents the planted root from rotting and reduces the risk of disease. On the sixth day, the pieces are placed in thin layers in prepared boxes, covered with sand or earth.
Video “How to prepare the soil and tubers”
If you do not know how to properly prepare the soil and potato tubers for planting, this video is for you.
