How To Grow Tomato And Strawberry Seedlings

2023 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-26 20:34

Trying is not torture

I am a city dweller, and therefore I could not imagine that I would enjoy digging in the ground in the garden. But one day last year, listening to the radio "Maria" of Galina Aleksandrovna Kizima's "Advice to Gardeners" programs with the corner of my ear, I suddenly realized what an interesting and exciting occupation it was.

Then purposefully all winter I listened to her advice on the radio, read books and magazines, bought seeds. And as if she had discovered a new world for herself. And at the end of February, when jars with seedlings of pepper, leeks and celery appeared on my windowsill, I broke my leg. The doctors said that I would not be able to walk without crutches until autumn (and indeed, the plaster cast was removed only at the end of August).

Some friends advised me to give up this venture with seedlings, they say, I still can't take care of it, much less plant it.

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And now the story of how I, together with my children (7 years old; 4 years old, 1.5 years old), nevertheless raised a harvest that was not very large, but pleased us.

We planted different tomatoes - from the tiny Balkonnoye Miracle varieties to tall ones. Most of all I liked the tomato of the firm "Hardwick" of the dessert pink variety. We got 15-17 tomatoes from a bush, weighing 300-350 g each, the largest weighing 620 g. Their taste is incomparable. We cut them into slices and used them for sandwiches instead of sausages. I'll tell you about tomatoes first.

In mid-February, she began to harden the seeds. In a damp cloth, I put them in the refrigerator for two days, then took them out and left them in the room for two days. So I alternated for a couple of weeks, making sure that the seeds did not dry out, but were a little wet (I put a little snow on it).

I sowed peat-sand-chalk into the mixture (instead of ash, which we did not have), added powder AVA fertilizer. She sowed the seeds already hatched, to a depth of 2 cm. After the appearance of the first loop, I put them on the windowsill, in the evening and in cloudy weather, they illuminated them with an ordinary fluorescent lamp. To increase the illumination, I put a foil-plastic screen (foil on thin foam rubber) from the side of the room, which remained after the repair. This at the same time helped well to protect the plants from the dry, hot air of the battery.

In the afternoon, in sunny weather, she shaded the plants with thin white paper.

I dived the seedlings into plastic cups of 250 g. Once a week I watered them with Uniflor-Bud solution, twice sprayed them with Oxykhom to protect them from late blight. To reduce growth in the 8-leaf stage, I cut off the top of the plants with four leaves and a long stem and immediately set them to rooting. She took the water as thick as two fingers.

I prepared a nutrient solution (1 teaspoon of honey in a glass of water) and added 1 teaspoon of it to cups with tops. I threw out the lower part. After 2-3 days, they had the rudiments of roots, and I planted them in the same cups. After another week and a half, the root system completely filled the cup. As a result of this procedure, tomatoes have grown about 50 cm shorter and more stocky than unprinted tomatoes (this is especially important for low greenhouses).

We went to the dacha only on June 14, the seedlings were dark green, 40-50 cm high. Since my husband could not help me in the garden, I had to look for technologies that require the least labor costs. I will note that we have no electricity in our country house.

I planted the seedlings in a plastic greenhouse. At first, I gradually spilled the earth in each hole with five liters of water. Then she poured half a teaspoon of AVA and one dessert spoon of superphosphate on the bottom, mixed them with the ground and planted the seedlings there vertically, slightly deepening.

After the end of planting, she watered the soil and mulched it with peat with ash in a layer of 8 cm. I did not feed anything else, I had to water the tomatoes only once during the period of fruit growth.

During flowering, the children covered the ground under the tomatoes with foil from chips so that there was more sun. Shaped into two stems, pinned, tied up. Experienced neighbors said that I had a decent harvest despite the harsh summer. But the main thing is that the children and I were able to cope with all the work on our own, without outside help, and this work was our joy.

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She sowed the leeks of the Iolant variety on seedlings at the end of February, then at the stage of two leaves she sowed it into film "diapers". Every three weeks she unrolled them and added 1 tablespoon of earth. She planted it in a bed fertilized with compost at an angle, at an angle of 45 degrees, shortening the leaves and roots by 1/3, adding 2 granules of AVA fertilizer during planting. Plants quickly started growing: both up and in breadth. Several times we spud the leeks, a total of 30 cm. In September, we harvested large plants with a bleached stem up to 25 cm, 6-7 cm in diameter. Smaller specimens were left to winter, at the end of October they were covered with peat.

Experiments on strawberries were not without. She planted her mustache on a bed covered with black spunbond, in cross-shaped incisions, added 1 teaspoon of AVA fertilizer to each hole. Sprayed with phytosporin for fungal diseases. There was no need to weed or loosen (weeds do not grow, moisture and soil structure are preserved. The berries did not hurt at all.

In August, I cut the spunbond and rooted as many mustaches as necessary, cut off the rest. I poured 1 glass of milk of lime under each bush, did not feed anything else (the AVA fertilizer contains enough microelements for three years).

The neighbors presented a lot of very young mustaches of good varietal strawberries, but I no longer had developed beds, and I could not dig sod. I got out of the situation like this: in July I processed the grass around the apple trees with "roundup". At the end of August, the weeds were completely dry, including the roots.

Now the sod could be easily removed without digging like a rug. Jars of water were dug into the ground at the soil level. She planted her mustache in curtains around the jars. With a sharp knife, I renewed the mustache slices and lowered them into the water. Shaded with lutrasil. At the end of September, all the bushes already had new leaves. In the spring I will plant them on permanent beds on black spunbond, or maybe I will try on roofing material, it is cheaper, and the effect is promised the same.

What a vegetable garden without zucchini. We planted them on a rotten sod heap, covering it with old plastic wrap, just like strawberries. I did not water, did not weed, but there were a lot of zucchini. We still eat zucchini Negritenok.

Taking into account my capabilities, I planted all the vegetables a little, made mixed beds. The most successful was the one on which perennial onions grew in the middle, then two rows of carrots to the edge, and a row of beets along the very edge. Mint, tarragon and parsley were planted at the ends of the bed. The vegetables were not sick, no one chewed them.

After harvesting the vegetables, I sowed all the beds with white mustard. Since my vegetable beds alternate with strawberry beds, in the fall the garden looked unexpectedly beautiful (they say that it is also useful). The strawberry bushes grew and completely covered the beds with foliage. The alternation of dark green strawberry foliage with light green mustard was amazing, especially against the background of the frozen grass in the rest of the site.

This is how the children and I combined business with pleasure. They defeated my infirmity, got pleasure, an interesting experience and, of course, our own, the most delicious vegetables and berries. Maybe my experience will help those who think that he will not cope with the hard work of a gardener. In fact, it is interesting and exciting, especially if you are not afraid to experiment.