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Not every gardener decides to grow eggplants at their dacha. This nightshade crop is distinguished by its capricious character. The homeland of eggplant is distant and hot India, so it is quite difficult for this vegetable to grow in our northern latitudes. But nothing is impossible for our gardeners. The experience of many generations has shown that the main thing in growing eggplant is seedlings. The harvest of this capricious crop depends on how strong and healthy it turns out. We will tell you below how to prepare eggplant seedlings and ensure their normal growth.
Benefits of eggplant
All the capriciousness of eggplant is more than compensated for by its benefits. The statement that eggplant contains a good half of the periodic table is absolutely unfounded. This vegetable contains the most essential vitamins and minerals for humans:
- fiber;
- protein;
- calcium;
- phosphorus;
- vitamins C, PP, B1, B2, B5;
- soluble sugars;
- pectin and others.
As a bonus to such a composition rich in nutrients, eggplant has a low calorie content. Not only will it not cause any harm to your figure, but it will also help you get rid of those annoying pounds.In addition, due to the fiber contained in this vegetable, eggplants have a slight diuretic effect and remove excess fluid and toxins from the body.
The nicotinic acid included in its composition will help the body of even the most heavy smoker cope with nicotine starvation.
“Capricious” eggplant seedlings
Problems with eggplant seedlings are quite a common occurrence, which occurs not only among beginners, but also among experienced gardeners. Most often, after the first shoots appear, eggplant plants either stop growing completely or grow very poorly. There may be several reasons for this behavior of seedlings:
- Unsuitable or poor soil composition - eggplant seedlings can still at least put up with an unsuitable soil composition, but they will not be able to grow in soil poor in minerals. Pre-sowing preparation of the land and application of fertilizers will help to avoid such problems.
- Lack of light - only hatched seedlings especially suffer from this. If you do not provide them with proper lighting at this stage, they will stop growing.
- Damage to the root system is the most common problem of stopping the growth of eggplant seedlings. The root system may rot if there is excess moisture or be damaged during transplants. In these cases, any growth stimulator should be used.
- Lack of space - this reason for stunted growth is determined quite simply. To do this, the seedling is carefully pulled out of the pot. If its roots are brown, then the plant is suffering from lack of space and needs to be transplanted into a larger container.
To avoid such problems, eggplant seedlings need to be planted and grown correctly.
Preparing eggplant seedlings
This is one of the few crops that are recommended to be grown only by seedlings. This is due to the fact that eggplants have a very long period of growth and ripening, on average about 130 - 160 days, so when planting seeds immediately in a greenhouse, you may not receive a harvest.
Preparing eggplant seedlings has much in common with growing pepper seedlings, but there are a number of features.
Soil preparation
Like all nightshade crops, eggplants are very demanding on the composition of the soil. For seedlings, the soil should be light and moisture-absorbing. At the same time, it must contain sufficient nutrients, and the acidity level should not be higher than neutral. Of course, you can use store-bought soil for seedlings of nightshade crops, but it would be much better to prepare it yourself.
The prepared soil is stored either on the balcony or in the barn.
There are two options for preparing land for eggplant seedlings:
- An option for the “lazy” – garden soil after cabbage or cucumbers is suitable as soil for seedlings. You should not take soil after the “relatives” of eggplants, such as peppers, tomatoes and potatoes.
- The ideal option is to mix compost humus, low-lying peat and old sawdust in proportions of 2: 1: ½. If the site has clay soil, then another ½ washed sand is added to this proportion. Moreover, if you are taking really old sawdust, you should wash it twice with boiling water, then pour it with a solution of urea and sprinkle it with wood ash.This is done so that during the decomposition process the sawdust does not waste the nitrogen needed by the seedlings.
Regardless of whether the soil was bought in a store or prepared independently, before planting the seeds it must either be poured with boiling water with the addition of potassium permanganate, or steamed. Also, before planting seeds, it is recommended to fertilize the soil with superphosphate, wood ash, urea and potassium sulfate.
Preparing and sowing seeds
The timing of these events varies slightly between regions. For the southern regions, which can grow eggplants in open ground under a film, seedlings begin to be prepared in mid-March, and planted in a permanent place from May 25 to June 10, that is, after the frosts have completely ended. For everyone else, it is preferable to grow eggplants in a greenhouse. When planted in a greenhouse, seedlings must be older than when planted in open ground. Therefore, seeds should be planted at the end of February or beginning of March, and planted in the greenhouse no later than May 15–20.
For planting, you should choose only high-quality eggplant seeds from trusted manufacturers. But even such seeds need pre-sowing preparation, which includes:
- Sorting – at this stage it is necessary to select only whole and undamaged seeds. After selecting whole seeds, they should be soaked in water for 5 to 10 minutes. After this time, it is necessary to collect all floating seeds from the surface of the water - they are empty and should not be planted. Disinfection - this procedure is necessary in order to wash off any pathogens of fungal or viral infections from the surface of the seeds.To do this, the seeds are soaked in a weak solution of potassium permanganate for 25 - 30 minutes. After this, they should be washed thoroughly. During this treatment, the seeds may become brownish-black in color. Some manufacturers disinfect their seeds themselves; they provide information about this on the packaging. These eggplant seeds do not need to be soaked in potassium permanganate.
- Seed treatment to increase germination – without this procedure, eggplant seeds may take a very long time to germinate. Therefore, it is recommended to treat them with boric acid, ash solution or ready-made liquid fertilizers based on humate.
- Germination of seeds – this is the longest of all pre-sowing procedures. To germinate, eggplant seeds are placed between layers of damp cloth. The tissue with the seeds is placed on a saucer, which is placed in a plastic bag. If the saucer with the seeds is not placed in a bag, the fabric will quickly dry out, and so will the seeds. The optimal temperature for germination is no more than 25 degrees, and the germination period is up to 5 days.
After such preparation, the seeds can be planted in the ground. To do this, use bleach cups or pots. A few hours before planting the seeds, soil in cups watered settled water or a weak solution of potassium permanganate. 2 - 3 seeds are planted in each of them to a depth of 1.5 - 2 centimeters. You should not plant the seeds very close to each other; it is better to leave 2–3 centimeters between them. The planted seeds are covered with soil and compacted a little. Before emergence, the cups should be covered with glass or polyethylene and kept at a temperature of 20 - 25 degrees.
A mark is made on its surface at the desired depth level. When planting, the pencil is simply placed in the ground to this mark, thereby making holes with the required depth.
If the seeds were planted germinated, the first eggplant sprouts will appear on the 4th – 5th day. If dry seeds were planted, the first shoots will appear on the 8th – 10th day. After most of the seeds have sprouted, the glass or polyethylene should be removed from the cups and moved for a week to a bright, cool place with a temperature of about 18 degrees. This hardening will allow young seedlings to grow roots instead of leaves.
We recommend watching a video that will show you how to plant eggplant seeds for seedlings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrmAmyb9fmk
Care to ensure the growth of eggplant seedlings
In order to get a good harvest of eggplants in the future, it is not enough to simply plant them. The seedlings of this crop must be carefully looked after - only in this case the gardener’s efforts will be properly rewarded. Caring for eggplant seedlings includes:
- illumination of seedlings;
- watering;
- transplant;
- feeding;
- hardening.
Let's go through each point in more detail.
Seedling lighting
Additional lighting is recommended for seedlings of many crops, and eggplant is one of them. This is especially true for early eggplant seedlings, which were planted in February - March. During these months, daylight is not able to compensate for the light needs of young plants.
Fluorescent lamps are used as an additional light source; they are also called fluorescent lamps. They provide proper lighting without heating up. Fluorescent lamps should not be placed very close to young eggplant plants.The optimal distance will be 15 – 30 cm. Turn on fluorescent lamps only in the morning and evening.
Therefore, each gardener independently regulates the duration of additional illumination of seedlings depending on the lighting conditions in his apartment or house.
Without additional lighting, seedlings of this capricious crop can:
- grow poorly;
- stretch out;
- It’s too late to start flower buds.
If it is not possible to additionally illuminate young eggplant plants, then it is recommended to place them in the sunniest place. In this case, you need to monitor the density of the plants. Indeed, with strong density, some eggplant plants will receive more light, while others will receive less.
Watering
Eggplants like fairly moist soil. But despite this, it is not recommended to water them after the first shoots appear. Only if the top layer is very dry, you can moisten it a little with a spray bottle.
The first watering of eggplant seedlings is carried out on the 2nd - 3rd day. All subsequent waterings should be done no more than once every 5 days. Water for irrigation must be warm and must stand for at least one day. It is best to water in the morning. When watering, you should try not to get it on the leaves of the seedlings - eggplants don’t like it.
When growing eggplants, it is very important to recognize the line between drying out the soil and over-wetting it. In the first case, prolonged drought will have a detrimental effect on the sensitive root system of eggplant plants. In the second case, excess moisture can provoke the appearance of various rots and other diseases.
Transplanting seedlings
Eggplant seedlings have a rather weak root system, so picking will not benefit it. In order for the plants to have a place to grow roots, they are transferred from one cup to another. This is done about a month after germination, when the plants have their first two true leaves. The container for transfer should be larger than the container in which the seedlings grew before.
Before transplanting eggplant seedlings, water them thoroughly. If this is not done, then when removed from the pot, the soil from the roots may crumble, thereby damaging them.
Feeding seedlings
As eggplant seedlings grow, their nutritional needs also increase. Therefore, skipping this stage of caring for seedlings is not recommended.
The very first feeding of eggplants should be carried out between 10 and 15 days after transplanting the seedlings.
For the first feeding of young plants, various fertilizers are used, for example:
- mineral fertilizers such as Kemira universal, Mortar or nitrophoska in the amount of 1 teaspoon per 5 liters of water;
- humus-based fertilizers - “Ideal” or “Effect” in a dosage of 1 teaspoon per liter of water;
- organic fertilizers - you can use any organic matter, but the use of bird droppings shows good results. To do this, dry droppings are diluted with water in a ratio of 1:20 and allowed to stand for a while.
All feeding of seedlings is carried out only at the root. If it gets on the foliage, the fertilizer is washed off with a spray bottle.
All subsequent fertilizers of seedlings are carried out every 10 - 15 days.
Hardening of seedlings
Hardening is a mandatory part of caring for eggplant seedlings that will be planted in open ground. But this does not mean that this procedure should be skipped when growing in a greenhouse. Compared to regular seedlings, hardened eggplant plants will have higher immunity. In addition, they will grow and bear fruit better.
There are two options for hardening off young eggplant plants:
- Hardening is carried out 7 - 10 days before planting the plants in a permanent place. To do this, either open a window in the room where the seedlings are located, or take the plants out onto the balcony.
- Hardening can also be done in a greenhouse. To do this, the seedlings are placed in a greenhouse at the end of April, but not planted. If frost is expected, the plant is covered with film or non-woven material.
Following these simple rules of care will ensure excellent growth of eggplant seedlings. But even the best seedlings can be ruined by untimely planting in a greenhouse or open ground. In the case of eggplants, it is worth waiting not only for the complete end of spring frosts, but also for a certain height of the plants. It is worth planting seedlings in a permanent place only after they reach 20 centimeters in height. By this time, 6–8 leaves should already have formed on the thick stems of the eggplant seedlings. It was during this period that the plants have already developed a good root system and are ready for planting.
This video will show you how to care for eggplant seedlings in a greenhouse:
