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Disputes about how to grow properly tomato seedlings, do not subside for decades. Each breeder and gardener has their own planting rules, which they adhere to from year to year. What planting tomato seedlings can be considered the right thing to consider when choosing seeds, dishes and soil for tomatoes, as well as ways of caring for seedlings - in this article.
How to properly plant tomatoes for seedlings
Growing tomatoes consists of several stages, one of which is sowing seeds for seedlings and caring for them. The goal of any gardener or summer resident is to get a good harvest of tasty and aromatic tomatoes. In order to achieve an excellent result, you will have to go through several stages:
- Select seeds and tomato variety.
- Buy or build containers for tomato seedlings.
- Mix the soil.
- Prepare seeds for planting.
- Sow seeds in the ground.
- Dive tomatoes.
- Prepare seedlings for transfer to a permanent place.
Each of the stages of growing tomato seedlings needs to be described in more detail.
Selection of tomato seeds
First of all, the owner of the site must decide on the variety of tomatoes. In this case, several factors must be taken into account at once:
- Ripening dates of tomatoes... So, for open ground, it is better to prefer early ripe and medium varieties of tomatoes, and late tomatoes are also suitable for greenhouses.
- The height of the bushes... As a rule, tall tomatoes are grown in greenhouses or greenhouses - there they save space and give good yields. While in the beds it is more convenient to care for low-growing tomatoes, because they do not have to be tied to trellises, protected from wind and drafts, regularly pinned and pinched.
- Region in which tomatoes will be grownis also very important in the selection of the variety. There are tomatoes specially bred for the climate of Siberia or the Urals. Such varieties will not be able to develop normally in the hot south, because they were developed for a humid and cool climate. Also, thermophilic varieties of tomatoes will not give a good harvest in cold regions - the plants will spoil late blight, they will die from night frosts or wither from lack of sun.
- From that in a greenhouse or outdoors tomatoes will be grown, a lot also depends. Greenhouse crops are more capricious, they love a humid microclimate, regular care, a comfortable stable temperature, but they delight the owner with abundant harvests of beautiful fruits. But garden tomatoes are less capricious, their fruits are more aromatic and tastier than greenhouse ones, these tomatoes tolerate low night temperatures and a slight drought well.
- Not only taste, but also the appearance of the fruit plays an important role in the selection of the variety. After all, there are tomatoes for pickling, they are medium in size, rounded, dense peel. There are also tomatoes intended for salads, they are distinguished by their large size, sugary pulp, excellent taste and smell. To decorate the dishes, they use cocktail varieties or cherry tomatoes that resemble cherries: they are just as small and round. Another distinguishing feature is the color of the fruit. After all, tomatoes are not only red, there are even black and purple tomatoes, not to mention the more standard green and yellow fruits.
All this needs to be analyzed at the preparatory stage.Only after deciding on their capabilities and requirements for tomatoes, they choose a specific variety.
It is good if the ripening time of tomatoes is different - then the family will be able to eat fresh vegetables from mid-summer to the end of autumn.
When buying seeds over the Internet, you need to pay attention to the number of seeds in one bag: there are professional and amateur packaging of seeds. For amateurs, tomatoes with 10-12 seeds in a package are suitable, and for professional cultivation, you need to purchase large quantities - from 500 to 1000 pieces per package.
Dishes for tomato seedlings
How can you grow tomato seedlings without pots and boxes? Tomato containers are sold in a huge assortment, you can find ordinary plastic pots, and wooden boxes, and peat glasses, tablets, cups with a removable bottom, snails and much more.
In order not to waste extra money, containers for tomato seedlings can be easily found on your farm or built from improvised means. After all, everyone can put together a box from unnecessary planks, what can we say about "snails" or "diapers", which are rolled up from dense polyethylene.
It is necessary to plant tomato seedlings only in sterile dishes. Therefore, even purchased brand new glasses will have to be disinfected. For this, it is convenient to use a strong manganese solution: the seedling container is simply immersed in the liquid for a few minutes, after which the dishes are allowed to dry.
As cups, you can use trimmed tetra packs from juice or milk, glasses from yogurt or baby curds. In general, whatever is in the house will do. An exception is made of metal dishes - it is wrong to grow seedlings in such containers.
Soil composition
Prepared and sterile containers must be filled with seedling soil. It must be remembered that tomato seedlings should be planted in slightly acidic loose soil that can retain moisture.
Ideal for tomatoes is a soil obtained by combining two parts of humus and one part of black soil. If there is no fertile land on the site, it can be replaced with any purchased seedling mixture.
Another "recipe" for a mixture suitable for tomatoes: humus, sand and turf soil, which can be found in the garden under the trees or in the area with weeds. To disinfect the soil and prevent germination weeds together with seedlings, you can use one of the methods:
- freezing the earth in the freezer or outside in winter
- calcining the soil in an oven or microwave
- watering the earth poured in a container with boiling water
- soaking the soil with a manganese solution (done a few days before sowing the seeds so that they do not burn).
There must be holes in the bottoms for drainage of water, it is better to install glasses and boxes than a stand in order to provide better ventilation. The drainage layer at the bottom of the container is very effective; it can be laid out from small pebbles or broken shells.
Tomato seed preparation
Of course, the seed material of good agricultural firms will sprout without preliminary preparation. After all, such seeds go through several stages of processing: from disinfection to hardening and feeding.
But homemade seeds, collected by their own hands or donated by neighbors, must be pre-processed before planting in the soil:
- Inspect seeds and discard uneven, deformed, darkened specimens.
- Dip the tomato seeds in salted water, stir with a spoon and remove all the seeds that have floated to the surface. These seeds are empty, they will not germinate.
- Disinfect seeds in one of a variety of ways.One of these methods of disinfection is soaking tomato seeds in water with the addition of hydrogen peroxide (per 100 ml of water - 3 ml of hydrogen peroxide).
- After disinfection, germination can be started. Before that, you can still treat the seed with growth stimulants or place them for a day in an aqueous solution of wood ash (a few tablespoons of ash in a liter jar of boiled water). You need to germinate seeds on a damp cloth or cosmetic cotton sponges. This stage will take several days.
- Germinated seeds can be placed in the refrigerator for a day - this will harden the seedlings, facilitate their acclimatization after diving and transplanting into the ground.
Many gardeners do not germinate tomato seeds, considering that fragile sprouts are very easy to damage when planting.
How to properly plant seeds in the ground
If tomato seeds have been previously germinated, they must be transferred to the soil very carefully. It is very convenient to use tweezers for this. Each seed must be placed vertically, directing the sprout up. From above, the seeds are carefully sprinkled with dry earth and do not press down. It is not necessary to water the seedlings, you can sprinkle the earth from a spray bottle with warm water that has been settled during the day - this will somewhat compact the soil.
For swollen or dry seeds, any sowing method will work. It is convenient to sow seeds in wooden boxes or general containers in pre-prepared grooves. To do this, with a wooden stick or a blunt knife, stripes are drawn on the soil: a depth of about centimeters, the distance between the lines is about 4 cm.
Tomato seeds are placed in the grooves at intervals of 2-2.5 cm. A thicker planting will lead to the fact that the seedlings will be weak and frail, the plants will not have enough nutrients and moisture.
Ideally, if the gardener does not have to irrigate the seedlings before the first shoots appear. In extreme cases, it is allowed to slightly irrigate the dry ground from a spray bottle.
The seeds are sprinkled with a centimeter layer of soil and slightly compacted by pressing with your fingers. Now the boxes need to be covered with cellophane and removed to a warm place for several days (7-10).
When green shoots begin to appear, the film must be removed immediately, otherwise the seedlings may "rebuke" and turn yellow. The air temperature at all stages of growing tomato seedlings should be at least 23 degrees.
Dive tomatoes
It is better to plant tomato seedlings with a dive stage. Tomatoes have a fairly strong root system, so they tolerate transplanting to a new place well. The diving stage is necessary when tomato seeds are sown in a common container.
Also, diving helps to harden the seedlings a little, making them more stocky and strong. At this stage, you can slightly reduce the growth of too elongated tomato seedlings - the plants are simply buried in the soil by cotyledon leaves.
Before diving, tomato seedlings should be watered abundantly with warm water. Use a knife or small metal spatula to remove the plants. You need to try to capture not only the plant itself, but also a clod of earth between the roots.
If weak or damaged tomatoes are identified, they should be discarded. During the dive, the strongest and strongest plants are selected. Tomatoes are planted in separate containers, one or two plants in each. If the method of planting in pairs is chosen, at the stage of formation of the fourth or fifth leaf, it will be necessary to pinch a weaker tomato, and tie the stems of both plants with a nylon thread.In this way, it will turn out to grow stronger seedlings, which will give a bountiful harvest.
Containers with dived tomatoes do not need to be placed in too bright sunlight.
While the plants are acclimatizing, it is better to use artificial lighting or arrange the seedlings on dimly lit windowsills.
Care of tomato seedlings
Growing seedlings on your own, you can be sure of their quality. But for a good result, you will have to work a little:
- Water tomato seedlings only with soft water. It can be settled, boiled, melt water, which is heated or kept near heating devices. The water temperature for irrigating seedlings should be about 20 degrees.
- Fertilizing seedlings is not always necessary. Tomatoes may have enough nutrients, especially if high-quality seeds were used, they were fed, and fertile soil with a balanced composition was prepared for seedlings. The lack of trace elements will tell the sluggish appearance of tomatoes, drooping or yellowed leaves, marble spots on the foliage, a weak and thin stem. In this case, you need to add top dressing, after diluting the fertilizer in water for irrigation.
- Before being taken out to a permanent place, the seedlings should be slightly hardened. 10-14 days before planting, they begin to open the window in the room, later they take out the boxes for a few minutes on the balcony, and then you can leave the tomatoes outside, shading the plants from the scorching sun.
You can plant seedlings in a greenhouse or on a garden bed when 6-7 true leaves have appeared on each plant, there are first buds, tomatoes have reached a height of more than 15 cm, have a strong stem and bright green foliage.
Final stage
The result of work on growing tomato seedlings will be planting plants in a permanent place. Before transferring, the seedlings do not need to be watered for several days, after which the soil in the cup will shrink and the tomato can be easily removed after turning the container over.
A tomato bush planted in a garden does not need to be watered during the first week.
Excessive soil moisture will only harm the tomato, it will be more difficult for the plant to get used to the new environment.
It remains to regularly water the tomatoes and apply fertilizers - and an excellent harvest is simply guaranteed! And we have already figured out how to properly plant tomatoes for seedlings.
