No carrots required special care, but the growing rules must be followed. It is a drought-resistant crop that tolerates frost and long-term cold snaps well. How to grow carrots? The secrets, like other vegetables, lie in proper agricultural technology.

It requires more care compared to other crops. Let's take a closer look at how to grow carrots in the country or garden plot with your own hands.

Soil preparation

You need to choose a bright place before growing carrots. The secrets lie in the fact that with a lack of sunlight due to falling shadows or an uneven surface of the bed, root vegetables lose sugar content and weight.

Before you grow good harvest carrots, you need to choose light and level soil. It should be sandy loam, light loam, with good drainage. In dense loam, the fruits grow small, and during storage they are quickly affected by rot. Carrots should not be planted on acidic soils. It requires a neutral or slightly acidic environment.

Before you grow good carrots, necessary

The bed is prepared in the fall so that it becomes established. It is made loose. To do this, add sawdust, humus, peat or sand. Chalk, lime, dolomite, and ash are used for liming. Manure should not be used for growing carrots, since the resulting root crops are not very attractive and do not store well. Humus should be added to poor soil - a bucket per square meter. If groundwater is close, the bed is made high.

The arable layer is well formed with the help of green manure roots - plants that create a good soil structure. They are sown in the garden bed in the fall in order to plant carrots in this place in the spring. Worms and microorganisms also create good soil structure.

Carrot beds should be constantly changed. The predecessors should be garlic, onions, cabbage, potatoes. How to grow large carrots, if you have to grow the same crop in one place? Entering will help here wood ash twice a year in the amount of 0.2 kg/m2, followed by digging.

In the spring, a week before planting, the bed is leveled, loosened, treated with a 0.3% vitriol solution, and watered warm water, after which they are covered with polyethylene film. During this time, it will retain moisture and warm up well in the sun.

How to prepare seeds for sowing

The germination rate of carrot seeds is low - 55-75%. In this regard, the seeds should be taken fresh. In addition, carrots do not germinate uniformly. After 2-3 weeks, the first shoots should appear. Seeds take a long time to germinate due to the presence on their surface essential oils, slowing down the penetration of moisture.

Before growing, you need to prepare for sowing. Let's look at several ways to pre-germinate them.

Soak

The seeds are poured into cloth bags and kept for a day. warm water. The water must be changed every four hours. You can make a nutrient solution from it by adding wood ash (30 g/l). Afterwards, the seeds must be washed.

The method will be more effective if additional hardening is performed. Seeds in moist bags are placed in the refrigerator for 2-5 days.

Soaking with nutrient solution

Use a weak solution of potassium permanganate with the addition of ½ teaspoon of fertilizer per liter of water or a mixture of nitrophoska and boric acid(1/3 teaspoon and 1/2 teaspoon per liter of water, respectively). The seeds are scattered on gauze folded several times, and also covered with it on top and filled with solution for a day. The liquid level should be just above the fabric. Then they are washed with water and put in the refrigerator for three to four days.

If the weather does not allow planting seeds, they are left on the bottom shelf of the refrigerator, keeping them moist at all times. In this case, you need to make sure that they do not grow more than 0.5 cm.

Heat treatment

Heat treatment of seeds consists of their sequential immersion in hot and cold water. They are poured into a bag and rinsed at a temperature of 50 degrees, and then dipped in a humate solution and kept warm for two days. As a result, the germination of not only carrots, but also parsley and dill is accelerated.

Bubbling

Bubbling speeds up the seed preparation process. An air or oxygen supply hose with an emery stone filter at the end is connected to the bottom of a non-metallic container with water. A net with seeds is placed on top.

During the bubbling process, the water is saturated with air. At home, a small aquarium compressor is enough for this. The bubbling time for carrot seeds is 17-24 hours. Afterwards, the material is removed to the middle shelf of the refrigerator, where it is stored for 3-5 days. Before sowing, the seeds are dried for 12 hours so that they become free-flowing and sown.

Burying seeds in the soil

Dry seeds are placed in fabric bags and buried in the ground with a shovel to the depth of one bayonet, where they should remain for at least 10-12 days. Then they are taken out and sown in a garden bed. After such treatment, seedlings should appear within five days.

Another method is to mix the seeds with moist peat and keep them in a warm place for at least one week. During this period, they manage to germinate, after which they are sown. Before planting in the ground, the seeds are dried for 20-25 minutes on parchment or cloth at room temperature.

How to grow carrots. Secrets of sowing and care

Before planting, seeds that are most suitable for a particular region are selected and purchased. You can also get them yourself. Before growing carrot seeds, you should find a good and large root crop, and then plant it in the spring. By autumn it will ripen.

Carrots take about three months to grow. To get a harvest in September, planting should be done no later than May. Sowing dates range from the end of April to the first ten days of June. Planting before May 5 is considered optimal.

Before winter, carrots are planted when the soil becomes cold enough. This could be from late October to early November. The timing of sowing and harvesting depends on the variety and region. Northern varieties They should not be planted in the south as they will grow slowly. If grown in middle lane southern varieties, they produce abundant tops, but root crops do not develop. Some varieties bred abroad are poorly stored.

Should be done on time, otherwise beneficial features and the shelf life of root crops may deteriorate.

Small carrot seeds should be spread evenly in the furrow. Therefore, they are mixed with sand or peat and sown in a garden bed.

So that neighboring rows do not interfere with its growth? To ensure sufficient illumination, it is better to make the beds narrow - no more than four rows of carrots.

Sides are made along the edge to prevent water from flowing down. The distance between rows should be 15 cm, and for late varieties- 20 cm. The bed is watered with water and sprinkled with ash. The seeds are placed in the grooves at a distance of about 2.5 cm.

When planting in spring and summer, the swollen seeds are planted shallowly - 3-4 cm. They should be sprinkled with very light soil, which is chernozem mixed with peat, sand or humus. Then a ventilation gap is made of film over the bed at a distance of about 12-15 cm.

The first shoots appear in warm weather within a week. If the temperature is below 12 degrees, the time is doubled. If there are empty spaces, additional sowing is done.

For many gardeners, the question is how to grow early carrots, is problematic. It's actually not difficult. Carrots are sown in autumn early varieties to a depth of 2 cm, and then sprinkled with mulch to a height of 3-4 cm. In this case, the soil temperature should be below +5 degrees. When there is little snow in winter, the beds are additionally covered with it to a height of up to 50 cm. With this method of planting, the harvest is harvested 2-3 weeks earlier than usual.

Plant thinning

How to grow a good harvest of carrots if they have sprouted perfectly? To do this, you need to carefully thin out the seedlings after the third leaf appears.

All this is not as simple as it seems at first glance. To ensure that the plants are removed well, the bed should be watered and the soil should be carefully loosened. In addition, the operation should be performed during the day so as not to attract the pest - the carrot fly, which flies in the evening.

The shoots should be removed with tweezers, leaving a distance of at least 2 cm. The smallest shoots should be removed. The tops are thrown away from the garden bed. Under no circumstances should you leave it nearby so as not to attract pests. A good deterrent is onion arrows, which are chopped and scattered in the garden. You can cover the crops with special material. The earth around the plants is slightly crushed. After 20 days, thinning is repeated. In this case, leave a distance of 6 cm between the carrots.

The row spacing needs to be loosened and weeded (at least once a week) so that a sufficient amount of oxygen reaches the roots. After thinning the row spacing, you should mulch with compost or sawdust soaked for several weeks in a 2-3% urea solution.

How to grow large carrots? Here you need the correct dosage of fertilizers. They cannot be added in large quantities at once. Carrot beds begin to be fertilized with mineral water when 5-6 leaves appear. The frequency of feeding is 2-4 weeks. This crop especially does not like excess nitrogen.

As it grows, the top part of the root emerges from the ground and turns green. This is not harmful, but the taste is worse. How to grow sweet carrots so that it does not lose its taste? When root crops emerge from the ground, they are hilled up, raking up soil about 50 mm high on them.

Watering carrot beds

Poor germination of carrots is primarily due to drying out of the soil. Until it emerges, the top layer of the bed should be constantly moist. Sometimes the soil should be watered even several times a day. Granular seeds have a particularly difficult time germinating. Immediately after sowing, protect the bed with film so that the top layer does not dry out.

Until the roots appear, watering is done every 3-4 days, 3-4 buckets per 1 m2. At the same time, they independently grow in depth and find moisture. Therefore, watering is carried out once a week, 1-2 buckets per m2, and from the end of August - once every 1.5-2 weeks, 8-10 liters per square. The beds are kept without watering for two weeks before harvesting.

Rough root vegetables are an indication that they lacked moisture. When there is an excess of it, the fruits grow small. Sudden changes from drying out to excess moisture are also harmful, leading to cracking of the carrots and subsequent poor preservation.

Carrots are not afraid of cold weather, but at temperatures below 8 degrees, the starch in root vegetables turns into sugar, and the shelf life of root vegetables worsens. In the middle zone, the harvest is harvested at the end of September in dry weather.

Collected for 1.5-2 hours, and then the tops are cut off. The harvest is sorted, straight carrots are placed in a ventilated box in a dark and cool place. This could be a cellar or basement.

Conclusion

You will never be able to harvest a good harvest if you do not know how to grow carrots. The secrets of agricultural technology lie in proper preparation soil, proper landing and care. As a result, in the fall you will get large and even root crops.

Carrots, along with potatoes and onions, are one of the main vegetables, so all gardeners find a place for them in their plot. Proper cultivation carrots are the key to a rich harvest. Even in small areas you can get a high-quality and productive harvest. And if you combine the implementation of the basic rules of agricultural technology with the advice of experienced gardeners, you can achieve great results in growing carrots, while also saving your labor costs and precious time that can be spent on rest. In our article we will tell you how to grow carrots correctly so that they are large.

Carrot sowing dates

Experienced gardeners know how important correct term sowing. The productivity of root crops directly depends on this. After all, it's time to mature different varieties varies widely. In addition, it is necessary to focus on the desired harvest time.

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To obtain early carrots, the so-called “bundle products,” winter or spring sowing of early ripening varieties is practiced. True, the first option is not possible in all cases. climatic zones. In severe winters, seeds freeze even under a thick layer of covering material. Therefore, it is better to give preference to early spring sowings. They can be carried out immediately after the top layer of soil has warmed up.

A return of cold weather will negatively affect the shelf life of root crops and can provoke the active formation of flower shoots. But for bundle products these flaws are not a hindrance. That is why early ripening varieties can be sown much earlier.

The main reasons for small-fruited carrots

• Carrots do not tolerate swampy lowlands or closely spaced fruit and forest tree crops. It will not be smooth and graceful, much less large, when grown in the shade, under the garden canopy.
• The culture needs deep loose nutrient soil, air- and water-permeable. The presence of small crushed stone, pebbles, rhizomes and other inclusions in the soil causes distortion and crushing of carrot roots.
• The root crop needs bright lighting. Beds with carrots are positioned so that each plant receives sufficient lighting. Tall crops (tomatoes, eggplants) should not shade carrot tops. It is better to place carrots to the south of their tall neighbors.
• Carrots will not bear fruit in acidic soils. Therefore, a year before sowing a crop on a designated bed, the soil is deoxidized by adding humus, chalk, lime, dolomite flour. The soil under carrots should be neutral with zero acidity within the pH range of 6-7.
• Ugly, branched, burst carrot roots and small root crops are obtained due to poor soil preparation, spring pre-sowing deoxidation of the soil, the use of fertilizers containing chlorine, and excess nitrogen fertilizers, thickened crops.
• The value of carrots is determined by the amount of useful substances that are formed in the root crop as a result of metabolic processes with the timely receipt of moisture and nutrients. Therefore, the lack of moisture and nutrition at the beginning and their excess at the end growing season carrots will change not only the external shape and characteristics, but will also significantly reduce the taste.

Preparing a bed for planting carrots

Carrots grow slowly and, as already mentioned, are afraid of excess moisture. If the soil has the ability to accumulate water, then organize ridge beds - raise the soil by 25-35 centimeters. If the soil dries well, then simply make grooves with a distance of 20-25 centimeters from each other. Before planting, the ground is leveled and loosened a couple of days before planting, then watered. You can cover it with film so that the earth “steams”. The seeds are soaked before planting. Plant the prepared seeds in stripes at a distance of one and a half to two centimeters from each other. Then the top is covered with a mixture of organic fertilizers or peat with sand, depending on the prepared soil.

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After this, the bed is covered again with film. This is necessary to save heat and moisture; if everything is done correctly, then with this method, seedlings appear already on the sixth day after planting. As soon as the first green shoots appear, protective film cleaned up. In addition, it is necessary to take into account crop rotation - the order in which crops are grown in a specific area.

Preparing carrot seeds for sowing

A high carrot yield directly depends not only on proper care of the crop in the garden, but also on the quality of the seeds used. If a gardener buys material from a trusted manufacturer, and knows for sure that in the spring there will be green shoots in the beds, then there is no point in doing additional germination checks. It’s another matter when the seeds are bought from grandmothers at the market or prepared independently. In this case, it is worth using the entire arsenal of knowledge on how to prepare carrot seeds for planting.

To begin with in the spring, before planting, you need to perform several general procedures:

• Mechanically check and reject low-quality seeds. It is not difficult. You just need to inspect and manually select all the small and discolored seeds from the bag. You should also throw away anything that is damaged or appears empty.
• To be sure, gardeners carry out calibration. All material is poured into warm water and mixed. Everything that floats up is merged with the water. The rest can be soaked in warm water for a day, then dried and started sowing.
• Another calibration option is to soak the seeds in salt water. The concentration of the solution is from one to three tablespoons of salt per glass of water. The more salt in the solution, the tougher the seed sizing. After the procedure, all material suitable for sowing is washed and dried.
• Many gardeners consider it a good idea to check before planting collected seeds for germination (this applies not only to carrots). The procedure is carried out only if there are a lot of seeds. It takes about ten days. Place a napkin on the bottom of the plate, sprinkle seeds (100 pieces) evenly, soak in water, cover with glass and place in a transparent container. plastic bag. If after a while 80 seeds sprouted on the plate, then the germination rate is 80% and the material can be used. If less than 60 pieces hatch, then there is no need to waste time, germination is very low.

How to sow carrot seeds in open ground

Sowing methods that can facilitate this process:

1. Mix small seeds with sand: mix 1 tablespoon of seeds with 1 glass of sand, then divide the resulting mixture into 3 parts and use each part for 1 m2 of beds.
2. Mix carrot seeds with seeds of beacon plants (lettuce, radishes). They emerge much earlier and thus show us where the carrot seedlings are located. This gives us the opportunity to carry out the first weeding of the carrot bed, without fear of damaging the plants, much earlier than usual.
3. Liquid sowing of carrots is also very convenient, in which the sprouted seeds are mixed with a liquid paste made from potato starch. Then they are carefully “poured” into the grooves from the teapot.

Then we cover the seeds with loose sifted soil or a mixture of peat and sand, or clean peat with light compaction to ensure better contact of the seeds with the soil and an influx of moisture.

Watering and weeding carrots

Regular watering is necessary. When the first shoots appear, water as carefully as possible, trying not to wet the greens. Allow the soil to dry out carrot beds undesirable, especially during the period of increasing size of root crops. If there is a lack of moisture in the soil, by mid-summer carrots may stop growing, and root crops may become distorted and hardened. It has been noticed that when irrigation is resumed after a drought, root crops begin to crack and are no longer suitable for long-term storage. After each watering, be sure to loosen the plantings to a depth of 6 cm and remove all weeds. Weeds not only reduce the supply of nutrients to root crops, but also provide an additional source of nutrition for the main carrot pest, the carrot fly. When the tops of the plant reach a height of 15 cm, it is advisable to mulch the plantings.

Fertilizing carrots during the growing season

Increases productivity root dressings. A solution of slurry, bird droppings, urine of farm animals, to which a tablespoon of superphosphate is added per bucket of the composition, is used during the period of active growth of the above-ground part of carrots and the formation of root crops (late May - mid-July).

1. The first fertilizing is usually carried out in the 4-leaf phase, 23-25 ​​days after mass germination, using nitrogen compounds, for example, urea solution (25 g per standard bucket of water).
2. The second feeding is done 3.5 weeks after the first. Carrots respond well to complex mineral supplements, for example, nitroammophoska (30 ml per bucket of water).
3. One and a half to two months after sowing, the stage of thickening of root crops begins. During this period, it is advisable to add wood ash.

Harvesting carrots

The ripening time for carrots depends on the variety and is usually indicated on the packet of seeds. It is better not to throw away the bag or to calculate the expected harvest day in advance, in the spring. Why? Carrots pulled out ahead of schedule, does not ripen, does not have time to accumulate a sufficient amount of sugars, which negatively affects its taste qualities. Carrots that are over-exposed in the garden, on the contrary, have an excess of sugars and amino acids, and this, in turn, makes them a tasty morsel for pests - carrot fly larvae, mice and rats. If you still don’t know exactly when to harvest carrots, focus on the color of the tops. As soon as they start to turn yellow lower leaves– carrots are ready for harvesting. To ensure that root crops remain juicy for a long time, they should not be watered the day before digging.

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Immediately after harvesting, the tops of the carrots are cut off. Otherwise, it will draw some of the moisture from the root crops during drying. After cutting the tops, the carrots are ventilated under a canopy or dried in the sun for 2-3 hours. It is recommended to keep carrot roots at a temperature of 10-14 °C for 7-10 days. During this time, just like potatoes put into storage, they undergo a kind of “quarantine”: cut points and minor mechanical damage heal, sick and spoiled root crops make themselves known. Before harvesting carrots into storage, they are inspected and sorted again, removing all unsuitable root crops.

Carrots are one of the basic vegetables of the diet. It is used in the preparation of many dishes from soups to side dishes. In addition, everyone knows the beneficial properties carrot juice. Fresh carrots can be stored for quite a long time, so in winter they are one of the main sources of vitamins. How nice it is to enjoy fresh carrot salad in winter! It is not surprising that this vegetable can be found in almost every garden.

Carrots are considered an unpretentious vegetable, and novice gardeners do not pay due attention to it. But, unfortunately, this leads to a poor harvest. So let's figure out how to grow carrots correctly.

Particular attention should be paid to choosing a place to plant carrots. Neither excessively wet nor dry soil is suitable for this vegetable. In the first case, the carrots begin to rot, in the second, they grow, dry and tasteless. The soil should be light and loose. It is also necessary to take into account the fact that carrots categorically do not like soil fertilized with manure, even if this fertilizer was applied in the fall. Therefore, it is recommended to use only mineral fertilizers, which must be paid a month before planting.

Carrots grow poorly in beds where parsley and lettuce were grown the previous year. It is also not recommended to plant carrots in the same place year after year. This vegetable is suitable for areas where garlic, onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, cabbage or potatoes were grown.

Carrots are sown in late April - early May. By this time, the earth will have warmed up sufficiently, but will remain moist. Carrots can be planted earlier, but in this case the crops should be covered with film. Most gardeners recommend soaking the seeds in warm water or a biologically active solution before planting.

The soil in the garden bed must be loosened well. Then make shallow grooves every 20 cm. It is convenient to press them with the edge of the board. The furrows are shed with water and sowing begins.

Carrot seeds are very small, which creates inconvenience when planting. On sale you can find seeds glued to thin paper tape. This type of tape can also be made manually using thin strips of tissue paper and flour-based paste. Using a toothpick, paste is applied to the paper at a distance of 2-5 cm, and a carrot seed is glued on top. The resulting ribbons are rolled out into grooves and sprinkled with a centimeter layer of soil. Many gardeners choose this method, since in the future, when the first shoots appear, the carrots will not need to be thinned.

You can use another method that is suitable for planting any small seeds. The seeds are mixed with fine sand in a ratio of 1:5. The grooves are sprinkled with this mixture.

When the carrots have put out their first true leaves, they need to be thinned out. Carrots are thinned out, leaving the strongest shoots. At the same time, they try to ensure that the distance between the remaining shoots is approximately 3-4 cm. If the carrots were planted using paper strips, then at this stage they do not need thinning. The second thinning must be carried out when the tops have grown to 10 cm. During the second thinning, the distance between seedlings is increased to 6 cm.

Carrots need regular watering. It is enough to water it twice a week. The soil should not be over-moistened, otherwise the carrots will begin to rot.

Also, do not forget about regular weeding. The first weeding is done 10 days after sowing carrots.

Carrots are considered fully ripe when the bottom of the tops begin to turn yellow. Depending on the composition of the soil, carrots are dug up with a pitchfork or shovel. Then the tops are cut, leaving 2 cm at the base. The carrots are left for 5 days in a dry place, away from sunlight, so that they dry out. After this, the carrots are placed in boxes, sprinkled with sand, and placed in the basement.

By following simple rules for growing carrots, you will get a good harvest.

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How to grow a good harvest of carrots in your garden plot

Carrots are always present on our table - a root vegetable that is a source of carotene, our orange...

How to plant carrots correctly

Many gardeners do not know why carrots are bitter in winter and what needs to be done to make carrots long and juicy.

The answer to the question of how to grow a good crop of carrots at your dacha is not as simple as it might seem at first glance.

The quantity and quality of the harvest directly depends on the type and condition of the soil.

This useful culture It is quite demanding in care, loves light very much and does not tolerate even slight shading. At the same time, carrots are one of the most drought-resistant crops; they easily tolerate frost and remain viable during prolonged cold spells.

The quality of the grown carrot crop depends very much on the condition and type of soil. To obtain a rich harvest, it is necessary that the soil is light in mechanical composition, its arable layer is deep, fertile and with good drainage. Sandy and light loamy soils with a neutral or slightly acidic environment are best suited for carrots.

The soil for carrots should be light in texture.

Speaking about the topsoil layer, you need to keep in mind that in eco-farming it is formed not as a result of digging or deep plowing, but with the help of the roots of green manure - cultivated and weed plants grown as organic fertilizer, microorganisms and worms. They structure the soil layers so thoroughly that no mechanical impact can be compared with them.

From others vegetable crops Carrots also have the advantage of being unpretentious to the plants that previously owned the garden bed, but the best predecessors of carrots are cucumbers, zucchini, tomatoes, all types of cabbage, potatoes, onions, garlic and any legumes.

Carrots should not be grown in the same place for more than 3 years.

How to properly prepare soil and seeds for sowing

Soil preparation

They begin to prepare a bed for carrots in the fall. Stones are selected from the ground that can prevent root crops from growing. Then humus or compost is added to the poor soil at the rate of 10 liters per 1 square meter. m, acidic - chalk, heavy - sawdust, river sand and peat. In addition, the bed can be covered with mulch or seeded with green manure.

In the spring, about a week before sowing, clods of earth are broken up with a rake in future beds and their surface is leveled. Then the beds are watered with water at a temperature of +30-40°C, and then covered with plastic film, which will help protect the soil from drying out and create conditions for it to warm up.

Seed preparation

Carrots are extremely light-loving - attempts to grow this crop, both in the shade and in partial shade, are completely useless.

Carrot seeds have low (only 55-75%) germination. Therefore, it is necessary to sow exclusively fresh seeds.

Carrots take a long time to sprout. This happens approximately 14-20 days after sowing. Such a long germination is explained by the fact that carrot seeds contain essential oils that prevent the penetration of moisture into them, as a result, the process of swelling and germination slows down. Seed growth begins only after the essential oils are washed off from their shell, so when the weather is dry, the germination of root crops is delayed. To prevent this from happening, carrot seeds must be prepared for sowing.

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Methods of pre-sowing seed preparation

• soak;

The seeds are poured into fabric bags and immersed in warm (+30°C) water for a day, which must be changed every 4 hours. Seeds can also be soaked in a nutritious aqueous solution of wood ash (1 tablespoon of ash per 1 liter of water). At the end of soaking, the seeds should be rinsed in clean running water.

Experienced gardeners to obtain best result combine soaking with hardening. To do this, wet fabric bags with seeds are placed in the refrigerator and kept for 2 to 5 days.

• heat treatment;

Fabric bags with carrot seeds are immersed in hot (+50°C) water for 20 minutes and then in cold water for 2 minutes.

• bubbling;

Thanks to bubbling, the seeds ripen faster.

The seeds are soaked in water saturated with air or oxygen. The bubbling container must be made of non-oxidizing materials. A hose is connected to it, through which air is supplied from a compressor or oxygen cylinder. A filter made of an emery wheel is placed on the end of the hose. A net for collecting seeds is placed above it, attached to the ends of the container. The container must have a hole to drain the saline solution or water.

During the bubbling process, the entire layer of water is uniformly saturated with air. On a small, non-industrial scale, you can use a compressor for a home aquarium. In this case, the ratio of water and seeds should be 5:1. The bubbling time for each crop seed is different. For carrots it ranges from 17 to 24 hours. If air is supplied rather than oxygen, the bubbling duration is increased by a third.

• burying seeds in the soil;

Fabric bags filled with dry seeds are buried in cold soil to the depth of one spade bayonet for 10-12 days. Seeds treated in this way germinate 4-5 days after sowing.

You can mix the seeds with moist peat and place them in a warm place for one week where they will germinate. Then sow them as usual.

After using any of the above methods, carrot seeds must be dried for 20-25 minutes at room temperature. They are then sown in open ground.

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How to properly sow carrots and care for them

Carrots are grown in a seedless way. In this case, the timing of its sowing in open ground is as follows:

• in winter: 2nd half of October - 1st ten days of November;
• in spring: 3rd ten-day period in April - 1st ten-day period in May and 1st ten-day period in June.

Carrots have small seeds, which makes sowing them quite difficult. In order to prevent thickening of crops, a little trick is used. A level teaspoon of seeds is mixed with a glass of sand and 10 square meters are sown with this mixture. m.

Carrots grow best in narrow beds with no more than 4 stripes. If you plan to grow only carrots in the garden bed, the sowing technology is as follows. Before spring sowing, grooves are cut on a previously prepared ridge. The distance between them is 15 cm for middle and early varieties, 20 cm for late varieties. The furrows are watered with water. In colder climatic zones, hot water heated to +50°C is used for this. Then the beds are powdered with ash and prepared seeds are sown on them at a distance of 1.5-2 cm.

The sowing depth and condition of the seeds depend on the season:

For summer and spring sowing, swollen seeds are used. They are planted at a soil depth of 3-4 cm. After sowing, the furrows are carefully sprinkled with soil and mulch (humus or peat). Having finished sowing, the beds are covered with film, which is raised on bricks by about 5 cm.

Before winter, carrot seeds of early varieties are sown to a depth of approximately 2 cm. They should be dry, and the thickness of the mulch layer should be 3-4 cm.

Before winter, carrots are sown when the temperature in the soil drops below +5°C. If winters have little snow, the beds with crops are additionally covered with snow, with a layer thickness of 40-50 cm. This technology allows you to harvest the crop 14-20 days earlier.

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Caring for carrots requires the following conditions:

• temperature regime;

For carrot seeds to germinate, a temperature of +3...+5°C is sufficient. The optimal air temperature for normal growth and formation of high-quality root crops is +20…+22°C. At the same time, carrots are resistant to cold, its shoots can withstand frosts down to -3-4°C and die only when the temperature remains below -6°C for a long time. The tops of adult plants die when the temperature remains below -8°C.

• watering mode;

The volume and frequency of watering directly depend on weather conditions and the age of the plants. Basically, carrots need to be watered once every 7 days according to the following scheme:

1. 3 liters of water per 1 sq. m of land at the very beginning of the growing season.
2. 10 l per 1 sq. m after secondary thinning.
3. 20 l per 1 sq. m during the period of root crop growth.

When there are approximately 2 months left before harvesting, it is necessary to water once every 10-14 days with 10 liters of water per 1 square meter. m of soil. When there are 2-3 weeks left before harvesting root crops, watering is stopped.

When growing, it is necessary to monitor soil moisture. There should be no excess or lack of moisture in the soil. Carrots, even for a short time, cannot be tolerated excess moisture, which causes rotting of root crops, and during prolonged drought, its root crops stop developing, which negatively affects the quality of the crop.

• weeding;

Carrots grow slowly, and the beds with them quickly sprout with weeds. To avoid the growth of weeds that inhibit the development of carrot shoots, you need to get rid of them. The carrots are weeded for the first time 10-12 days after the first true leaf appears on the plant. The second is 8-10 days after the next true leaf appears.

Weeding is combined with loosening the soil and thinning out the seedlings and is carried out after heavy rain or regular watering.

• feeding;

3-4 weeks after the seeds have hatched and the first shoots have appeared, the plants are first fertilized with an aqueous solution chicken manure, mullein, humus or ash (1:10). If necessary, fertilizing is repeated during the formation of root crops and plant growth. In areas where organic farming is practiced, due to which a layer of humus is formed in the soil, fertilizing is not necessary.

To avoid thickening, carrots are thinned out twice: 11-12 and 19-20 days after the appearance of the first shoots. After the first thinning, the interval between adjacent shoots should be approximately 3 cm, after the next thinning - 5 cm. This procedure is best carried out in the morning; after it is completed, the bed must be watered. Experienced gardeners treat the soil on which carrots grow with ground red pepper (hot, hot or bitter). This will muffle the smell characteristic of carrots and protect it from carrot flies. Another effective method protection against this pest is the combined planting of carrots and onions. You should not neglect mulching, which significantly saves the energy and time necessary to obtain a good harvest.