Tomatoes: So That Guests From The Tropics Take Root In Our Beds

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

Strong, healthy seedlings are the key to a future enviable tomato harvest. In the business of growing stocky, with large leaves and thick stems of plants, there are no unimportant trifles. Watering temperature and timing, lighting and humidity fluctuations are important factors that affect both root development and bud and ovary formation. What conditions must be provided for tomatoes?

Long journey of the golden apple

The path of the tomato to our table was long and arduous. In Europe, it appeared thanks to the travel of Christopher Columbus to America and has long been considered a poisonous plant. With his help, they even tried to poison prominent statesmen, but such a tasty attempt, of course, was survived.

In the tropics, the tomato is a perennial plant. In our latitudes, this plant was grown for a long time as an ornamental plant, because its fruits did not have time to ripen before the cold weather. Therefore, on the mainland of Eurasia, they did not know for a long time what the taste of a ripe tomato is. Until the agronomists managed to get the first crop through seedlings. And for three centuries now, gardeners around the world have been using this time-tested method.

Interesting fact: the name of the tomato is of Italian origin and means "golden apple". It was so called because of the golden yellow color of the fruits that were cultivated in this sunny region. The name tomato has more ancient Aztec roots and is consonant with how the Indian discoverers called them in South America.

Soil mixture for seedlings and seedlings

Seedlings of tomatoes are grown with a pick. But this intermediate procedure can be skipped by planting seeds in humus or peat pots. You can cook them yourself according to the following recipes:

• for 3 parts of rotted humus, take 1 part of sod land and add 1% mullein to the mixture. It is recommended to loosen the heavy composition of the earth. About 5% of coal dust is mixed with clay soil;

• seedlings in pots, consisting of 3 parts of peat, 1 part of sod land and 3% mullein, develop well.

Mix for pots is kneaded in water with the addition of superphosphate. This nutrient improves the quality of seedlings, it will increase yields and accelerate the ripening of tomato fruits.

Dive into the greenhouses

For early tomatoes, nutrient cubes are prepared in pots with a diameter of about 8 cm. When there are not enough pots for growing seedlings, you can cut the nutrient mixture into cubes right in the greenhouse and dive the seedlings in them. For this:

1. The ground in the greenhouse is covered with a layer of sawdust or sand.

2. The prepared mixture is moistened to such a state that a lump can be formed.

3. The resulting substrate is lined in a greenhouse with a layer about 10 cm thick.

4. The mixture is cut into squares with sides of about 8-10 cm.

5. After picking, the seedlings are watered with warm water and mulched with humus and wood ash.

The tropical nature of the tomato

A native of the tropics, the tomato is very picky about temperature, so it is important to carefully monitor its level:

• when sowing a plant directly in a panic, before the emergence of shoots, the temperature is maintained at around + 20 … + 22 ° С;

• when the seedlings hatch, the greenhouses are ventilated and the temperature is reduced to + 7 … + 10 ° С;

• after another 2 weeks, the temperature is raised to + 15 … + 16 ° C and maintained until the seedlings pick;

• after the picking procedure, the recommended temperature is raised to + 22 … + 25 ° С;

• after the seedlings take root in the new soil, the heat is again reduced to a level of + 16 … + 18 ° С.

Watering is recommended in the morning, so that they have time to ventilate in the evening, and the air humidity is not high. Watering is done plentiful, but not frequent, otherwise there is a high risk of black leg disease.