Cauliflower is one of my favorite vegetables along with white cabbage. How many delicious dishes you can make from it: casseroles, pies, salads - you can't list them all. I grow it annually on my site. But in order to achieve large, dense heads of cabbage, you need to make efforts.
When and how to sow seeds for seedlings
Depending on the type of plant, I select the planting time individually:
- I plant early varieties in March;
- medium - from mid-April to mid-May;
- late - from mid-May to June 10.
Before planting, the seeds are disinfected in potassium permanganate for 10 minutes, then soaked and hardened for 24 hours in the refrigerator.
For some time now, I plant seeds not in a box, but one in each glass. Cabbage often suffers from a black leg, so thickened plantings are contraindicated for it. I put anti-blackleg and ash in the soil. I water it in dosage, without flooding the plants. The disease with this method of planting manifests itself much less frequently. And if one plant gets sick, you don't have to throw everything away.
I put the cups in a warm place and cover them with foil. In a few days, sprouts will appear. When there are 2-3 of them, I carry out foliar feeding with a solution of boric acid.
Landing in open ground
Cauliflower is more demanding on soil temperature than its congeners, so you can plant it when the threat of frost has passed. Two weeks before disembarkation, I harden the seedlings: I take them to the balcony for a couple of hours a day.
I am preparing a bed for planting cabbage in the fall: I dig up and add a large amount of humus. In the spring, I add complex fertilizer to the prepared soil. The place under the cabbage should be sunny, it will not grow in the shade.
I prepare the holes, adding a handful of ash to each, and water them. When the water is absorbed, I plant the seedlings at a distance of up to half a meter, deepening to the first true leaf.
I cover early plantings with foil.
Cauliflower care
Caring for this crop is not much different from caring for a white cabbage. What cauliflower likes:
- The sun. In the shade, she doesn't even think of forming heads.
- Fertile soil. If planted in poor soil, it will grow at most the size of a fist. The high humus content ensures a good harvest.
- Abundant watering. After planting, I water it twice a week. When the cabbage grows up, I switch to regular watering once a week.
- Systematic loosening. I loosen plantings after every watering and every rain so that the cabbage "breathes".
- Timely hilling. This procedure is needed for root growth. I spend it several times a season.
- Top dressing three times a season. On the tenth day after disembarkation, I bring in a liquid mullein. After two weeks, I dissolve 2 tbsp in a bucket of water. l. superphosphate, 2 tbsp. l. ammonium nitrate, on the tip of a teaspoon of boric acid and the same amount of potassium chloride. After another two weeks, I apply complex fertilizer.
To make the heads of the cauliflower white, I shade them: I break the leaves of the rosette and create a kind of canopy.
Harvesting
I plant cauliflower with different ripening times, so I have this vegetable on my table all summer and autumn.
Early varieties ripen at the end of June, mid-ripening in early August, and late-ripening ones by September.
Harvesting must not be delayed, as cabbage can become loose and tasteless. It is best to do this in the morning. But if it's freezing in the morning, I harvest the cabbage at noon.
Compliance with the rules of planting and care allows me to include in the diet large crispy white cauliflower cabbage. I look at them and am proud of myself. I learned how to grow such a wonderful vegetable, which is not a shame to put on the table.
Read also: Let's figure out whether it is worth leaving the polycarbonate greenhouse open in winter or not.
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