Carrots are a fairly popular vegetable that is often used in cooking. It can be added to various vegetable salads or hot dishes, or simply eaten raw. Many vegetable growers prefer not to buy carrots, but to grow them on their own plot. Before this, it is recommended to familiarize yourself with how to plant carrots with seeds in open ground without picking and determine the last date for planting carrots.
Preparing for planting
Before you start planting carrots in open ground, you need to do some preparatory work. Preparation for planting is carried out in several stages.
When to sow carrots in open ground
First you need to decide when to plant carrots according to the lunar calendar in 2018.
To determine the exact timing of planting carrots, you need to know how long its seeds germinate. On average, they germinate within a month. However, carrots will need another 1-2 weeks for the bushes to grow to 10-15 cm. Therefore, it is recommended to plant them in mid-April, so that by summer you can get the first harvest. The deadline for planting is mid-May. It is impossible to postpone the last date for sowing carrots any further, as the bushes will grow worse due to the summer heat.
Seed preparation
When the optimal timing for sowing carrots is precisely determined, you can begin the preliminary preparation of planting material. There are several ways to speed up seed germination after planting. To do this, you need to place all the seeds in a small fabric bag and bury it in damp soil to a depth of 10 cm for several days. They should be in the ground for 24 hours, after which the seeds are removed and dried in the sun. This procedure accelerates the germination of carrots in open ground by 5-7 days.
Bubbling is also carried out before planting. It is carried out to reduce the germination time of carrots. To carry out this procedure, heated water is poured into a small container. After this, oxygen is supplied to the liquid and seeds are poured out that will need to be grown. All seeds are in water for at least 20 hours. They are then removed from the container, wrapped in a cloth bag and placed in the refrigerator for five days.
Some vegetable growers, instead of bubbling, engage in pelleting of seeds. During pelleting of carrots in the spring, its seed is covered with a special nutrient coating, thanks to which the germination process is accelerated. To carry out the procedure, soil mixture and liquid mullein are added to the glass. After this, seeds mixed with humus and peat are added to the container. Then the glass is covered with a lid and shaken well several times. It is recommended to carry out the procedure several days before planting in the ground.
Site selection
You need to choose a suitable site regardless of whether the carrots are planted as seedlings or seeds. It should be sown in the most suitable area. When choosing, you should pay attention to the soil. Sandy loam and medium loamy soils that contain no more than 4% humus are suitable for carrots. You can also plant this vegetable in areas with acidic and heavy soils. They should contain about 2% humus.
It is recommended to grow carrots in places where potatoes, cabbage, annual herbs or table beet previously grew. Some vegetable growers claim that it grows well after perennial grasses, as they improve the health of the soil and cleanse it of pathogens of various diseases.
It is also worth paying attention to the quality of lighting in the area. If you transplant a carrot into a poorly lit place, it will gradually begin to stretch out and this will negatively affect the amount of harvest. Therefore, it is better to choose a place in the garden that would be illuminated by the sun throughout the day.
Soil preparation
Planting carrots in open ground with seeds should be done in previously prepared soil. It is recommended to do this in September, no later than the 15th.Before planting, the soil is dug up and fertilized with humus. Mineral fertilizers consisting of phosphorus and nitrogen fertilizers are also added. Nitrogen fertilizers must be used very carefully, since their excess deteriorates the quality of carrots and reduces their shelf life.
To preserve all the positive qualities of the vegetable, 1-2 kg of phosphorus or potassium fertilizers can be added to the soil.
Fertilizers do not need to be added if humus has previously been regularly added to the soil on the site.
How to sow carrots without thinning
Some are interested in planting vegetables without thinning the bushes during cultivation. After all, not everyone wants to spend time thinning out the bushes during a dive. Therefore, it is worth familiarizing yourself with how you can plant carrots so as not to thin them out.
How to plant carrots on tape
This method of planting carrots is often used, which eliminates the need to thin out the bushes later. The main advantage of this method is the shelf life of the tapes with seeds. Paste is a reliable substance that does not lose its properties. Therefore, you can prepare ribbons for planting in the fall or winter. To store them, just roll all the tapes into a tube and place them in a box. It is not recommended to store the tapes in damp conditions to prevent the paste from deteriorating.
You can prepare the tape for planting yourself. To do this, you will need the following equipment for planting carrots:
- paste;
- toilet paper;
- water.
First, toilet paper is cut into small strips. Their length should be equal to the size of the beds, and their thickness should not exceed 2 cm. Paste is applied to the paper. Its drops are applied to the surface at a distance of 3-5 cm from each other.All seeds are placed on the paste and dried on it for 20-30 minutes.
Prepared ribbons with seeds can be planted in beds and covered with a small layer of soil. However, before this, the site must be prepared. To do this, several rows are created on it in which carrots will be planted on ribbons. In this case, you need to decide what distance between the rows should be. Plants should not be very close to each other, so rows are made at a distance of 40-50 cm.
How to sow carrots using egg trays
Sometimes egg trays are used when planting carrots. Use this method so you don’t have to deal with it later thinning sown carrots. Using trays, seeds are planted at equal distances.
The scheme for planting carrots with trays is quite simple. First you need to decide at what distance to make the beds. To prevent the bushes from interfering with each other in the future, the beds are made at a distance of 45-50 cm. After this, two egg trays are nested inside each other to make their structure more durable. Then the trays are placed on the ground with the convex side, and seeds can be sown in the egg holes. We sow no more than 2-3 seeds in each hole.
How to plant carrots in open ground in a bag
Some people are interested in whether it is possible to plant carrots in winter. This method allows you to plant the seeds in the soil at the very latest date for planting carrots. To do this, make a shallow hole in the garden into which a fabric bag with seeds will be placed. After 2-3 weeks they are dug up, since they will have sprouted sufficiently by this time. The dug up seeds are mixed with river sand and sown in the soil.
Care
To get a good harvest, you need to properly care for carrots during cultivation.
Watering
It is imperative to water the vegetable, since a lack of moisture can lead to lethargy of the fruit. To moisten the soil, it is recommended to use a special irrigation device that would immediately deliver water underground. To do this, pipes with special holes in the walls for water are dug in between the rows. At least ten liters of water should be consumed per square meter of land.
Top dressing
When growing carrots, fertilizers must be regularly added to the soil. The procedure must be carried out twice. The first feeding is carried out 20 days after planting the seedlings in the ground. Superphosphate, urea and potassium nitrate are added to the soil. The second feeding is carried out 60 days after the first. In this case, it is recommended to add fertilizers only after preliminary moistening of the soil.
Conclusion
Anyone can grow carrots. To do this, you need to decide when you can plant carrots in open ground and how to plant them correctly. To do this, you can consult with friends or watch a video that tells you when you can replant carrots.
