Top dressing when planting tomatoes

Tomatoes are present on the table all year round, fresh and canned. Tomatoes are sold on the market and in supermarkets, but the tastiest and most fragrant are those that are grown by hand on a personal plot. To get a rich harvest, choose proven regional tomato varieties, follow agricultural practices, use suitable fertilizers when planting tomatoes.

The tomato bush is a powerful plant, its root mass correlates with the ground part of 1:15, timely and adequate fertilizer of tomatoes will increase productivity, improve the presentation of the fruit, and grow it perfectly balanced in terms of the content of nutrients. Learn what fertilizers to apply when planting tomatoes throughout the growing season.

Fertilizing the soil in autumn

It is necessary to prepare the soil for growing tomatoes and add fertilizers to the soil in the fall, immediately after harvesting the predecessor crop. It is preferable to plant tomatoes after cucumbers, legumes, onions and early cabbage. After pepper, eggplant, potatoes, tomatoes cannot be planted, because they all have common pests and diseases.

Introduction of mineral fertilizers

Scatter fertilizer and dig up the earth onto a spade bayonet. Digging will oxygenate the soil and help kill some tomato pests. In autumn, organic matter, potash and phosphorus fertilizers should be applied. These rules are due to the fact that many potash fertilizers contain chlorine that is harmful to the tomato, which is quite mobile, and by the time the tomato is planted in the ground, it will sink into the lower layers of the soil. Phosphorus is poorly absorbed by the root system, however, by spring, it will turn into a form accessible to plants. Nitrogen mineral fertilizers of the soil before winter are practically useless, because nitrogen will be washed out of the fertile layer by autumn precipitation and spring floods.

Soil deoxidation

If the soil in the area is acidic, then it is necessary to deoxidize it. The safest and most convenient substance to use is dolomite flour. It is not necessary to carry out liming and fertilizer in one year. Maintain ph – soil balance, plan liming every five years.

Application of organic fertilizers

What is the best organic fertilizer for tomatoes? You can use cow dung. The optimal combination of price, availability of purchase and the content of almost all the nutrients necessary for a tomato. Manure not only enriches the planting area with nutrients, but also contributes to soil aeration, brings the ph reading to neutral, and promotes the development of beneficial microflora. Fertilizer application rate 5-8 kg per 1 m². If you can find horse manure, then take it 3-4 kg per 1 m² beds, because the content of phosphorus, potassium and nitrogen in it is higher. By spring, the manure will perepreet, mix with the earth and enrich it.

Fertilizers for seed germination and seedling cultivation

Buying ready-made tomato seedlings or want to grow them yourself? In the second case, prepare the soil by taking one part of peat, forest or garden soil, one and a half parts of humus and half of river sand and add a glass of crushed shells. Steam or spill the soil mixture with a pink solution of potassium permanganate. Mineral fertilizers are not used. Tomato seeds in branded packages can be germinated immediately, and the collected ones need pre-sowing treatment. Pour the seeds with 1% salt solution, take those that sink to the bottom of the container. Rinse and disinfect by soaking for half an hour in a 1% solution of potassium permanganate. Rinse and dry again. Soak according to the instructions for the preparations in Epin or Potassium Humate. After soaking the seeds in a warm solution for a day, germinate them on damp gauze.

Seedling fertilizer

Novice gardeners are often interested in what fertilizers should be used in the process of growing tomato seedlings. Feed the planted tomatoes with the yeast solution. Insist during the day 5 grams of bread yeast per 5 liters of water. Water twice during the entire period of home growing seedlings. More serious fertilizers are needed by the plant in the following phases of the growing season.

Fertilizing the soil in spring

If for some reason the land was not enriched in autumn, then fertilizers for tomatoes can be applied in the spring. Modern complexes contain both basic elements and additional ones: sulfur, magnesium, iron, zinc. You can scatter fertilizer granules on top of the snow, or after it melts, rake the fertilizer into the soil. Suitable for feeding tomatoes:

• Kemira wagon 2. A balanced complex of minerals for spring use;
• Kemira Lux. Water-soluble preparation, very convenient for application;
• Universal containing, in addition to macro and micro elements, humic substances. Environmentally friendly product, completely absorbed.

The dosage of universal fertilizers is given on their packaging.

Fertilizers when planting tomato seedlings in a greenhouse

If the climate does not allow growing tomatoes in open ground, then they can be planted in a greenhouse. Consider what fertilizers are optimal when planting a tomato in a greenhouse. Top dressing is done during planting seedlings. Make holes in advance, put humus, compost in them and add ashes. By setting fertilizer when planting tomatoes, you will provide them with minerals, macro- and microelements.

Herbal tea supplement

You can add natural fertilizer to the hole when planting greenhouse tomatoes: “herbal tea”. You can prepare it by grinding 4-5 kg ​​of plantain, nettle and other weeds. A glass of ash is diluted in 50 liters of water, a bucket of mullein is added and insisted for several days. The fermented infusion is topped up to a volume of 100 liters, and two liters of solution are poured under each tomato bush.

Fertilizer tomato in the hole when planting in open ground

The bed prepared in the fall is saturated with a complex of useful substances, and does not need mineral supplements. The day before transplanting seedlings into the hole, when planting a tomato in the ground, spill it with a pale pink solution of potassium permanganate. Pour 200 ml of pre-infused yeast mixture into the planting hole at the rate of 10 grams per 10 liters of water. Pour crushed shells and wood ash under the roots of the tomato. After planting the seedlings, compact the soil, sprinkle with a pinch of black soil or compost. Excess fertilizer when planting a tomato in open ground can destroy the root system. If seedlings are grown in peat pots, top dressing of tomatoes during planting is unnecessary.

Fertilizing unfertilized soil

Sometimes it happens that fertilizers for tomatoes were not applied during the main cultivation of the beds. The situation can be corrected by mixing one part at a time: humus, peat and fresh compost. Superphosphate is placed at the rate of: a tablespoon per bucket of the mixture. Leave the prepared mixture to ripen for a month and a half. When planting tomatoes, add two liters of top dressing under each bush. Water the planted tomatoes abundantly, and until the flowering period, the fertilizing work can be considered completed.

Top dressing with ready-made complexes

When planting a tomato in the hole, you can use factory fertilizers. They are balanced and formulated specifically for nightshade plants.

• “Hello” for tomatoes. Contains a complex of elements necessary for tomatoes.
• “Multiflor” for tomatoes. The complex can be dissolved in water, or it can be dry mixed with the soil and applied under the root when planting.
• “Agricolla” for tomatoes. The balanced complex is used as an aqueous solution. Watering is carried out under each bush, 4-5 times during the growing season. Nutrients are available in an easily digestible form.

Foliar dressing of tomatoes

Tomatoes are responsive to foliar feeding. Spraying the stems and leaves improves the appearance of the plant during the day, and the result of root fertilizer is noticeable after a week or even two. Leaves will absorb only the right amount of missing nutrients. During budding, you can spray the green mass of the plant with an extract of wood ash, for which two glasses of dry matter are poured with 3 liters of hot water, insisted and filtered for a couple of days.

Approximate feeding scheme

Subject to all the rules for growing tomatoes, an approximate feeding scheme is as follows:

• 2-3 weeks after planting seedlings. In 10 liters of water dissolve 40 g of phosphorus, 25 g of nitrogen and 15 g of potash fertilizers. Watering 1 liter of solution under each bush.
• Top dressing for mass flowering: 10 tbsp is used for 1 liters of water. l. potassium sulfate and 0,5 liters of liquid mullein and bird droppings. Water under each plant one and a half liters of fertilizer. Another option: add 1 tbsp to a bucket of water. l. nitrophoska, pour 1 liter under each bush. To prevent blossom end rot, spray the bushes with a solution of calcium nitrate, 1 tbsp. l per 10 liters of water.

  

• You can help the formation of the ovary by feeding the tomatoes with a mixture of boric acid and wood ash. For one bucket of hot water, take 10 g of boric acid and 2 liters of ash. Insist for a day, water a liter under each bush.
• The final tomato root fertilizer is aimed at improving the taste and ripening of the fruit. When mass fruiting begins, feed the tomatoes by dissolving 10 tbsp in 2 liters of water. spoons of superphosphate and 1 tbsp. a spoonful of sodium humate.

First aid for nutritional deficiencies

Tomato bushes themselves signal a shortage of fertilizers. A lack of phosphorus is manifested by a purple coloration of the lower part of the leaf and veins; spraying with a weak solution of superphosphate is necessary. A lack of calcium leads to leaf curl and fruit damage by blossom end rot. Spray the plant with a solution of calcium nitrate. With a lack of nitrogen, the plant acquires a light green or yellowish color, looks rickety. Spray with a weak solution of urea, or herbal infusion.

Watch your tomato plantation, monitor their well-being, and remember that it is better to under-fertilize than over-fertilize.