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Cucumbers are a culture that has long become one of the most popular in our country. Most gardeners prefer cucumbers, as cucumbers ripen early and bear fruit for a long time, and their cultivation does not require special care and does not force you to spend all the time in the garden. Each summer resident has his own way of growing and caring for cucumbers. Many grow cucumber seedlings first, and then transfer them to open ground, but not everyone knows that in most areas cucumbers can be planted directly in open ground with seeds, and this method is no less productive than seedlings. We will talk about this in the article.
Where and when is it better to plant cucumbers
Cucumber is a thermophilic crop, so seeds are planted only when the earth is warmed up to 15-18 degrees. In most regions of Our Country, this time falls on the middle – the end of May.
In order to more accurately determine when to sow cucumber seeds and its limits, you can calculate the date. Cucumbers ripen within 45 days, that is, if the sowing took place on May 25, then the first crop of cucumbers will be obtained on July 10. From this we can conclude that it is possible to plant cucumbers in open ground before the beginning of July, otherwise they will not have time to ripen and freeze.
Planting cucumbers should be carried out on those beds that are warmed up the most by the sun, and even better if there are trellises near them so that already large seedlings can rise. Do not sow seeds in windy weather.
It is best to sow cucumbers in the place where tomatoes, white cabbage or other types of cabbage used to grow.
Preparation for disembarkation
In order for cucumbers planted with seeds in open ground to give high productivity, it is necessary to prepare the beds and the required number of seeds for sowing.
Cooking the garden
In order to get a good harvest of cucumbers in the summer, it is best to sow seeds in a garden bed prepared in the fall. Where the cultivation will be carried out you need:
- Dig through;
- With increased acidity of the soil, dolomite flour, slaked lime, ash or special preparations are introduced;
- Next, you need to add organic fertilizers to the soil. This is manure, peat, humus or compost. They are needed in sufficient quantities, that is, up to kg per 1 square meter;
- Potassium sulfate is added in the amount of 60 grams per 10 square meters, this is very important for cucumbers;
- In the spring, this bed is raised so that it is not flat, manure and mineral fertilizers are again brought into it. Warming up the soil can be enhanced if the soil is covered with a film on top.
If the soil has not been prepared since autumn, then in the spring you can dig a trench about 80 cm deep, put coniferous spruce branches or branches of garden trees on the bottom of it. From above, everything is covered with compost and sawdust. The next layer is manure or humus. All this mixture is covered with loose soil no more than 25 cm thick. You can plant seeds in such a bed right away.
We prepare the seeds
First you need to choose the seeds in accordance with the purposes for which they will be used. Growing cucumbers from medium-term and long-term seeds is great for pickling for the winter, but sowing early-ripening seeds will delight you with the excellent taste of cucumbers in a salad.
Before proceeding with the preparation of seeds, you need to determine those that have good germination. To do this, dilute a teaspoon of salt in 1 glass of warm water and pour the seeds into the liquid. Those that immediately surfaced should be removed and discarded, since they most likely will not rise, but those that went to the bottom can be prepared for landing.
If the seeds are of the domestic type, that is, they were grown and harvested by the gardener on their own, and not bought in a store, then disinfection must be carried out before they are sown. It is carried out in this way:
- The seeds are soaked for half an hour in a weak solution of potassium permanganate.
- Washed with water.
- Wrapped in a damp cloth and sent to the refrigerator for two days for hardening.
Purchased seeds can not be processed, since during production they already go through all these procedures.
The process of seed preparation is clearly shown in the video:
planting cucumbers
Immediately before the cucumbers are planted, the bed is spilled with boiling water and covered with a film, which increases the reproduction of bacteria, which will warm the soil in the course of their life activity until the temperature stabilizes. You can wait 2-3 days after this procedure, but you can sow seeds immediately after watering in warm soil.
You can plant cucumbers in recesses or in a row. Rows are made 70-90 cm long. Recesses are dug 4 cm each and at a distance of about 20 cm from each other if cucumbers are grown in open soil. In the recess you need to sow two to four seeds. If both seeds subsequently come out, then they will need to be thinned out.
In order for cucumbers to grow strong and healthy and not die at the stage of the appearance of the first sprouts, you need:
- Prevent the appearance of a crust on the ground;
- Timely and with special care to remove weeds;
- Tie cucumbers immediately, without waiting for the moment when they become too long;
- After watering the cucumbers, loosen the beds;
- Cultivation is accompanied by plant fertilizer once every 10 days.
Caring for planted cucumbers
Caring for cucumbers is easy, the procedure includes the constant observance of certain conditions:
- Thinning. The thinning process is carried out twice for the entire time while cultivation is in progress, starting from the appearance of one leaf on the cucumber stem (partial thinning), the final thinning is done when 3-4 leaves have already been formed. The technology for removing an extra sprout is as follows: you just need to break it off, and not uproot it. So, you can keep the root system in order without damaging it.
- Topping. It is necessary in order to direct the vital juice of the plant to the formation of lateral female ovaries.
- Easy hilling, which will not allow moisture to accumulate in the roots of cucumbers. This item will help the cucumbers form an additional root system, which will significantly increase the yield in the future.
- Spraying produced to attract insects to cucumbers, which will produce pollination. To do this, the plant is sprayed with a solution of water with honey or sugar. The recipe is as follows: 1 grams of sugar and 100 grams of boric acid are taken for 2 liter of hot water.
- Loosening the soil. It is produced along with the cultivation and thinning of cucumbers. It is necessary to act very carefully so as not to damage the roots of the plant in any case.
- Weeding. It is carried out no more than 5 times in rows and nests, and between rows of cucumbers no more than 4 times.
- Mulching – produced using sawdust or straw so that the soil is saturated with oxygen, does not dry out, and the soil warms up evenly.
- Garter. It is carried out as the cucumber stem grows towards the pegs.
- Temperature. As mentioned earlier, cucumbers are heat-loving plants. In open ground, cultivation is carried out at an air temperature that ranges from 22 to 28 degrees during the day, and does not fall below 12 degrees at night. Cucumbers should not be allowed to freeze or, conversely, overheat. In both cases, they stop developing and die.
- Daily watering cucumbers are carried out with warm water.
How to plant cucumber seeds directly in the ground is shown in the following video:
Many gardeners grow cucumbers in the same way as seedlings. This is the most common method and is considered to be more productive than sowing seeds. But planting cucumber seeds in open ground gives an equally pleasant amount of harvest. The main thing is to comply with all the requirements and prepare both the seeds themselves and the soil under them. Do not forget that cucumbers are thermophilic, so they are planted at a certain time and place. Everyday simple care will give a high yield, which will please any summer resident who has tried to plant cucumbers with seeds in the ground.