How to feed eggplant after planting in the ground?
Despite all the advantages of this vegetable, eggplants are rarely grown by gardeners in Russia. The fact is that the culture is quite demanding - it grows only in a warm climate and has a long growing season. Unfortunately, not all climatic zones are able to guarantee a long hot summer.
In order to somehow realize the situation, it is important to provide vegetables with proper care, use greenhouses and hotbeds, and regularly fertilize plantings.
Culture Needs
Properly feeding eggplants is not a difficult task, because their needs for useful elements completely coincide with the requirements of tomatoes, and the latter culture is well known to domestic summer residents. It is acceptable to use organic fertilizers, including numerous folk remedies, as well as various chemicals. Best of all, eggplant will perceive a combination of both varieties.
Fertilizers should be applied quite often and in large quantities. If the soil condition is poor, then you will have to feed almost every week. Other recommendations for planting vegetables include choosing well-lit areas with nutritious and well-loosened soils. In addition, you should not place eggplant where tomatoes, potatoes and bell peppers used to grow.
Vegetables require nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium the most.Nitrogen allows you to rapidly increase the green mass, activate the growth and development of bushes, as well as the formation of fruits. Phosphorus is responsible for the root system - it helps them to better draw nutrients from the soil. In addition, this substance is responsible for the formation of ovaries.
Potassium intake contributes to better immunity - the culture will be able to painlessly respond to temperature fluctuations, fight diseases and develop. In addition, elements such as manganese, iron and boron are important. Their balanced consumption will positively change the taste and attractiveness of eggplant, and also guarantee the regular formation of inflorescences and ovaries.
Types of dressings
It is customary to fertilize eggplants with root fertilizers, which are applied immediately to the nearby soil, which allows the root system to quickly consume the elements, while there is no danger that the fruits or leaves will suffer. Feeding should be diluted only according to the instructions, observing the proportions. All fertilizers are usually diluted with settled water at a comfortable temperature, somewhere from +22 to +24 degrees Celsius.
If during the procedure the fertilizer accidentally gets on the leaves or stem, then they should be washed immediately with plain water. Foliar top dressing is used relatively infrequently, since eggplants have enough of what is applied to the soil. But if the condition of the soil is too deplorable, then additional spraying of nutrients may be required. When preparing foliar dressings, it should be borne in mind that the volume of water should exceed the useful elements several times than when preparing root dressings.
In addition, it is important that the concentration is lower.Each bush should take about a liter of the finished nutrient solution. For example, if the ovaries are poorly formed, and the number of flowers does not satisfy the gardener, then the plants can be sprayed with one gram of boric acid dissolved in a liter of water. Professionals recommend diluting the substance with hot water, and then supplementing it to the desired volume and concentration with liquid at room temperature. The procedure is carried out every 10 days, usually two approaches are enough. When growing eggplant, it may happen that the amount of greenery will be either excessive or insufficient.
If the mass is not enough, then the bushes should be sprayed with urea, and if there is too much, then with potassium; in both cases, the elements must be dissolved in the liquid.
What fertilizer to use?
To determine what kind of top dressing an eggplant will need, you will have to find out what it needs. For this, sometimes it is enough just to look at its appearance. If the leaves are small in size, their color is different from the usual, then this indicates a lack of nitrogen. In this case, the bushes first lose their color, then leaves fall from them, some of the fruits are deformed, and some, in general, do not ripen. In this case, nitrogen-containing fertilizers, such as urea, are applied to the soil. However, you can not overdo it with the quantity - too much substance will lead to the rapid growth of green mass, and nothing will remain for the fruits.
If the growth of the culture has slowed down, it may be lacking in potassium. And also this problem can be determined by the presence of brown spots on the fruits, or if the culture grows in the absence of a sufficient amount of sunlight. You can help eggplants by sprinkling the soil under each bush with a glass of wood ash.Finally, when the leaves suddenly turn blue, you should think about phosphate fertilizers.
If you do not intervene in time, then the leaves will begin to fall off, the ovaries will stop forming and the condition will worsen. From fertilizers, preparations containing phosphorus, for example, superphosphate, are suitable for this purpose.
Folk remedies
Ideally, eggplant fertilizers should be both organic and mineral, and their application should alternate. From organic matter, top dressing is usually carried out with humus or compost, manure, bird droppings, yeast and other natural substances. It is important to keep in mind that animal and bird waste cannot be used fresh, otherwise the plant will receive too much nitrogen. In addition, all organic matter must be infused and diluted in water. Application is carried out either simultaneously with the irrigation of crops, or immediately after.
For example, during fruit ripening, a bucket of litter and a glass of urea should be diluted in 100 liters of water. The solution is infused for three days, and then used in the proportion of 5 liters of the substance per square meter of beds. It is a good idea to prepare a fertilizer with yeast, which not only feeds the plants, but also protects against diseases. It will take about three teaspoons of fresh or dry yeast and two tablespoons of sugar, which are dissolved in 10 liters of warm water. The substance will be infused for about three hours, and then diluted with water, which will be five times more.
Such a fertilizer is suitable not only for eggplant, but also for tomatoes and cucumbers. You can simply dissolve half a kilogram of fresh yeast in 70 liters of water, insist everything for a day, and then cultivate the garden.
Ready mixes
Chemistry can also improve the condition of eggplant beds.Their plus lies in the fact that it is quite easy to calculate the required doses and proportions, and the minus is that mineral approvals are not absolutely harmless to the gardener and are less accepted by crops. Experts recommend purchasing superphosphate, nitrophoska, ammonium sulfate and potassium nitrate. Superphosphate meets the needs of the plant in potassium, nitrogen and phosphorus.
Nitrophoska has a similar effect. Ammonium sulfate will provide the plant with sulfur and nitrogen. There is a small exception to the use of this type of fertilizer: sulfur should not be added to the soil, whose acidity is increased - this will only worsen the situation. Potassium saltpeter is responsible for the supply of nitrogen and potassium, 10 grams of fertilizer is usually used for 10 liters of water.
Timing of fertilizer application
For the entire growing season, eggplants will have to be fed at least four times. If the soil is poor and unsaturated, then it is right to do this even more often - once every two weeks. Being in a seedling state, the culture must receive the necessary fertilizers twice. The first top dressing is made after the appearance of two true leaves. Usually this stage coincides with a dive.
Potassium and nitrogen are used as fertilizers, because they can make it easier for sprouts to adapt to a new environment. About two weeks before planting in open ground, eggplants are fertilized again. In addition to potassium and nitrogen, you also need to add phosphorus - all three of these substances are found in a fertilizer called superphosphate. The last element, that is, phosphorus, is responsible for the formation of the root system. This is very important when not yet fully developed bushes fall into a rather complex environment of open beds.
After planting, the culture is recommended to be fed somewhere else three or four times.The first feeding occurs two weeks after being transferred to the street. If this is done earlier, then the roots simply will not be able to perceive the proposed substances. As the first top dressing, it is allowed to use superphosphate again.
The next application of nutrients will occur when the first flowers appear. Eggplants will need nitrogen in the same quantities, but phosphorus and potassium will be twice as abundant. At this stage, it will be possible to add tuki or humate.
The third top dressing is carried out when the ovaries begin to form in the vegetable. It consists of potassium and phosphorus, and additional care may consist in sprinkling the earth near the bushes with wood ash (a glass per square meter of beds) or spraying with herbal or yeast solutions. The last top dressing, consisting of phosphorus and potassium, is carried out when the fruits ripen. However, there is a rule that it is performed only when grown indoors or in warm areas with long summers. If the land is not of good enough quality, then half a month after planting it would be good to fertilize the beds with manure dissolved in water, which is taken ten times more. Animal organics can be replaced with bird droppings.
During the second feeding, compost should be added - six kilograms per square meter.
When the culture blooms, you can spray the bushes with a solution of boric acid. In addition, at the moment the buds appear, a solution of herbs and manure will work qualitatively. Finely chopped nettle, plantain, dandelion and other herbs are put into a large container. The weight of herbs should reach 6 kilograms. After that, a bucket of manure and ten tablespoons of wood ash are added. The whole substance is poured with 100 liters of water and infused for a week.One liter of fertilizer will be used to process one bush.
For information on how to care for eggplant after planting in the ground, see the following video.