Good afternoon, my reader. Sometimes during spring planting it happens that part of the tomato seedlings is superfluous. She simply did not have enough space in the garden or greenhouse. It's good if you manage to attach it by distributing it to friends. It's a pity to throw it away! But you can do otherwise, planting it in separate containers - for example, in old buckets filled with fertile soil. Oddly enough, but tomato bushes feel quite comfortable in them and grow well, while not requiring special attention to themselves.
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Advantages and disadvantages of the method
The cultivation of tomatoes in buckets was actively practiced at the end of the 40s of the last century. Often old buckets without a bottom were used for this. However, this method was forgotten, and remembered about it very recently, after which it quickly began to gain popularity among garden owners. The harvest from the bushes planted in buckets is not less than that of the tomatoes grown in the traditional way. And the technology itself has a number of advantages:
- The fertile substance in a separate container (especially if it is black) heats up quickly, which leads to accelerated growth of the bushes.
- Fertilizers and irrigation water are consumed exclusively for the needs of the plant planted in them.
- Diseases of garden crops that spread in the open field will not harm tomatoes in buckets.
- In case of unfavorable weather conditions (prolonged rains, frosts), containers with plantings can be easily removed for a while in a dry and warm room.
- Weeding, if necessary, will not take much time.
- The stems of the bushes are stronger, and the fruits are larger than those of tomatoes planted in the usual way, and, most importantly, ripen much earlier (by 2-3 weeks).
There are practically no drawbacks of the method of growing tomatoes in buckets, except for the problem of finding necessary containers and several large labor costs associated with filling them with fertile substance. It should also be borne in mind that it will have to be changed every season.
Bucket preparation
Any (preferably metal) buckets with a volume of 10 liters or more are suitable for growing tomatoes: crumpled, broken, without handles. Buckets should be prepared in the fall. Several holes are punched in the bottom of each one to prevent water stagnation. The buckets are washed well, dried, after which a 2-3 cm drainage layer of expanded clay or small stones is laid on the bottom. Then the soil mixture is poured. It is mixed well, spilled with warm water, after which the buckets are removed to the greenhouse until spring.
How to plant tomatoes in buckets
The earth in buckets warms up much faster than open ground, so if you bring them into a warm room, you can start planting seedlings in them earlier than on the beds. If this is not possible, the usual dates for planting tomatoes are observed.
When the earth in the buckets warms up well, they begin to plant seedlings in them - one bush per bucket. Dig a hole about 15 cm deep in the ground in the center and spill it with a warm solution of potassium permanganate diluted in a proportion of 1 g per 10 liters of water. Ten minutes later, a seedling tomato stem is placed in the hole and buried in it to the lower leaves, after which the hole is covered with earth, which is then tamped a little. Then the earth is watered with warm (30-36 ° C) water, trying to do this so that later a crust does not form on the surface. The next watering is carried out only after a week (in cold weather) and is combined with shallow loosening of the earth.
Caring for bushes of tomatoes planted in buckets is not much different from caring for plants, grown in the traditional way in the beds or in greenhouses (regular watering, pinching, garter, feeding). And the harvest can be even more abundant.
Do you grow tomatoes in buckets?
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