Contents
Table beet is a valuable food product, which has a large amount of fructose, sucrose, fiber, pectin substances that are useful for our body. Beetroot is also widely used in a therapeutic diet, so most gardeners prefer to grow it on their site. How to properly prepare the garden for planting this vegetable crop, after which plants it is better to plant it, how exactly to do it, and how is beet growing in open ground?
Preparing for planting
Planting beets is carried out in the soil prepared and warmed up to the desired temperature. It must be fertilized using humus for this. Also an important condition for the normal growth of table beets is the reaction of the environment, the indicator of which is pH 6,2-7,5.
If, nevertheless, you are dealing with a site with high acidity, then it is recommended to carry out its liming. When this procedure is carried out, we can expect an improvement in the structure of the soil, as well as an acceleration of the microbiological processes taking place in it.
Lime material must be applied under the previous plant or directly during the beet sowing. Before digging the earth, ground limestone can be scattered around the site at the rate of about 0, and slaked lime or wood ash – about 8 kg per square meter. Lime is usually applied several times – most of it in autumn, less – in spring. Also, during the digging of the earth, special mineral fertilizers are evenly distributed over the site. A vegetable mixture is added to them at the rate of about 0 grams per square meter. Boron-magnesium fertilizers have also proven themselves well – about 5 grams.
For sowing, it is customary to select only the best seeds, the germination percentage of which can be about 80. Before sowing seeds, they are prepared in several stages – they are calibrated, selecting only large seeds, soaked, germinated, bubbled, dragged, polished, disinfected. When preparing for planting beets when using seedlings, preparatory measures are much less. The optimum air temperature for planting a root crop is from 15 to 18 degrees Celsius.
Under such conditions, the first shoots can be seen after a week.
For cultivation, you can choose different varieties of table beets. Today there are a great many of them. Early varieties allow you to harvest the first crop in 60 – 90 days (Red Shar, Cold-resistant 19, Bogema, Borshchevaya varieties). Medium varieties have a ripening period of about 100 – 110 days (Egyptian flat, Bordeaux 237, Bona, Detroit). It is customary to harvest the best late varieties somewhere after 120 – 130 days from the moment of planting (varieties such as Mulatka, Cylinder).
The best predecessors
Experts do not advise sowing beets in one place more often than once every three to four years. As the practice of many gardeners shows, beets grow best after such excellent vegetable crops as cucumbers, zucchini, squash, tomatoes, early potatoes and cabbage, legumes.
It is highly undesirable to plan the planting of beets after such vegetable plants that belong to the haze family – spinach, chard, and again, beets themselves. If you follow these simple rules, you can end up with a good harvest of your favorite root crop.
Video “Disembarkation Machine”
How to plant
Preparing beets for sowing seeds is a very responsible matter. After their preliminary selection, germination and processing by several methods, which have already been mentioned above, they should be planted. Please note that when you sow, since the seeds are collected in a bunch, you will soon need to thin out the emerging sprouts. Removed sprouts can be simply transplanted. Beets show a good degree of adaptability to new living conditions. It is sown for seedlings very early, when there is still snow. Crops can be destroyed by a harmful black leg. To prevent this, seeds and soil must be treated with special disinfectant solutions. Soil for seedlings is shed with potassium permanganate and calcined in the oven.
When you plant table beets in open ground, you will definitely use one of the planting technologies that exist today. The first of them is known to every gardener – planting table beets with the help of seeds. To speed up their germination, it is good to use the following solutions – take a quarter of a teaspoon of boric acid per liter of water, half a tsp. nitroammofoski or nitrofoski; a teaspoon of superphosphate per liter of water; a teaspoon of soda per liter of water; a tablespoon of wood ash per 1 liter. After you wash the seeds with warm water and wrap them in a piece of dry material, you can start planting them.
A line should be drawn on the bed, from which a groove is formed with a depth of not more than 4 cm, which is then moistened. Planting table beets outwardly very much resembles a lattice, at the intersection of the lines of which the seeds are planted. There are two planting schemes today – a single-line one involves planting seeds in pre-prepared furrows, between which a distance of about 45 cm is left, and a two-line one – when several such grooves are made with a distance of about 25 cm.
The growing period of seedlings of this root crop is quite short. It needs to be planted in a greenhouse, and after a couple of weeks, you can dive the shoots that have appeared and move them to the backyard. You can not overdo the seedlings, because in this case the seedlings are injured and the fruits may turn out to be deformed as a result. It can be transplanted into open ground with the onset of stable heat, when the night air temperature is above +7 degrees. The technology for planting table beets with seeds is much more complicated than if you plant them in seedlings.
Care
What are the features of agricultural technology of one of the best vegetable crops grown for many years in household plots? Caring for beets is not so complicated, but still, there are certain nuances in its agricultural technology.
First of all, caring for this root crop includes moderate watering. Of course, beetroot is a very drought-resistant crop, but it is recommended to water it regularly, as the soil dries up.
Experts advise using the sprinkling method, with this method, moisture will fall on the tops. With such care, you can count on the collection of a timely and rich harvest of your favorite root crop.
If the soil has not been mulched before, but the next day after watering, the ground must be loosened, while the depth should not be more than 5 cm. At the time when the vegetable crop begins to grow intensively, caring for it involves more abundant watering – up to three times per week, and after all the fruits are formed, it is again reduced to the norm, which is once a week. A month before the planned harvest, watering the site should be completely stopped.
Care also includes the mandatory introduction of recommended dressings. Fertilize the site begin after about three weeks from the moment of planting, subsequent fertilization occurs every couple of weeks. For these purposes, it is customary to use organic fertilizers and ordinary ash. Care also implies subsequent thinning – the first time in the presence of two leaves, so that the interval between them is about 3 cm, the second – when the fourth leaf appears, at a distance of about 4 cm, the third – in early August, then leave about 10 – 15 cm. Also weeding is required.
Video “Landing in open ground”
How to plant correctly, what to use – seeds or seedlings – you will learn from the video below.
