What kind of soil does carrots like?

A vegetable garden without carrots is something extremely rare; few will dispute the popularity of this root vegetable. But not everyone knows how to grow it correctly in order to end up with an enviable harvest. If we are to start with this science, so with the study of the soil requirements that carrots put forward. And this is a rather voluminous question.

This indicator affects not only the quality of the crop in general, but also the shape of the fruit. For example, in heavy clay soils, in insufficiently cultivated soil, carrots will grow small and ugly. Such a crop cannot be called good either in taste or in appearance. This means that it must be planted in a clean area, without large stones or plant roots. Carrots like loose, light soil, sandy loam or loamy, well-permeable. If there is a little sand in this soil, the better for the future harvest - it will be sweeter.

If the owners of the site do not know what kind of soil they have, you can always conduct an experiment. You just need to take a handful of earth from the site, add water to a doughy state, and evaluate the result:

• plastic clay soil will easily keep any shape;
• you can form a ball and a sausage from loam, but if you try to make a bagel out of it, cracks will go along it;
• a sausage and a ball are also made from medium loam, the bagel will disintegrate immediately;
• only a ball will form from light loam;
• sandy loam soil will make it possible to mold only a thin cord;
• from sandy soil, nothing will work.

And if a clod of earth, crumpled in a fist, leaves a black bold imprint, it means that there is black soil on the site, suitable for growing virtually any crop, and carrots too.

The optimum soil acidity for carrots is neutral, and these are pH values ​​in the range of 6.5-7.0. In slightly acidic soil, carrots are also grown, this is permissible. The humus content is 4%. You can determine acidity using a special device: a pH meter, but not everyone has one, so you will have to use alternative methods. For example, many summer residents prefer to do with litmus paper. It is sold in kits with a color scale and stripes that are pre-soaked in the desired reagents. It is not difficult to check with litmus paper whether the soil is acidic (neutral, alkaline).

• Dig a hole 30-40 cm deep... Collect 4 earthen samples from the walls, put them in a glass container, mix.
• Moisten the earth with distilled water 1 to 5. Wait 5 minutes, and then literally immerse a litmus strip in this mixture for a couple of seconds.
• Compare color, which turned out on paper, with indicators on the scale attached to the strip.

By the appearance of the earth, its acidity is also determined, however, this is not the most reliable option. For example, increased acidity is read by the whitish soil surface, water with a rusty tint in the depressions, brown sediment in the place where moisture has already been absorbed, an iridescent film on a puddle. Nettles, clover, quinoa grow on neutral soil - there it is worth planting carrots. If poppy and bindweed grow on the ground, the soil is alkaline. Sow thistle and coltsfoot settle on slightly acidic soil, also relatively suitable for carrots. And the sour soil is inhabited by horse sorrel, sedge, sweet bell, mint, plantain, violet.

This question is equally important. If there is a lot of moisture, the carrots will rot. It should not be forgotten that this is a root crop, and the rotting of what is in the ground will lead to a loss of yield in principle. In addition to decay, excess moisture is terrible in that it leaches valuable trace elements from the ground, making it less breathable. Therefore, it is necessary to check the moisture content of the soil before planting carrots.

It's good if you can get a tensiometer - an electrical resistance sensor, a household moisture meter. You can use other methods as well. For example, dig a hole 25 cm deep, get a handful of earth from the bottom of the hole, squeeze it tightly in your fist. Such experience will show:

• if the soil crumbled after clenching in a fist, then the moisture content is not higher than 60%;
• if there are fingerprints on the ground, then the humidity is about 70%;
• if even with light pressure the lump falls apart, the humidity is about 75%;
• if moisture remains on a piece of soil, its indicator is 80%;
• if the lump is dense, and a print remains on the filtered paper, the humidity is about 85%;
• from the compressed soil, moisture directly oozes, the moisture content is all 90%.

Each type of soil has its own requirements and rules for pre-planting preparation.... But there is also a general algorithm for preparing the beds, which involves, first of all, the autumn cleansing of weeds. After 2 weeks, the garden bed must be dug up by 30 centimeters, removing all rhizomes and stones. And be sure to treat the soil with disinfecting compounds. This will be, for example, a 3% Bordeaux liquid or a 4% solution of copper oxychloride.

In the spring, soil cultivation continues: it is loosened, and maybe re-dug up. Then the surface is traditionally leveled with a rake. The necessary fertilizers are applied to the dug soil. Also in the spring, the garden is watered with the following mixture:

• 10 liters of warm water;
• 1 teaspoon of copper sulfate;
• 1 cup mullein

If the soil is light loamy, it does not need sand. And to make it more fertile, you can add to 1 square meter:

• 5 kg of humus / compost;
• 300 g of wood ash;
• 1 tablespoon superphosphate.

Chernozem, despite its almost ideal parameters, also needs to be prepared for planting. Even in the process of autumn digging, the following is introduced into this land per square meter:

• 10 kg of sand;
• half a bucket of sawdust (always fresh and old, fresh sawdust should be moistened with a mineral fertilizer solution before adding);
• 2 tablespoons of superphosphate.

In the fall of this type of soil, a mandatory procedure awaits: liming with chalk or dolomite flour. For each m 2 make 2-3 tablespoons of any of these funds. If there is a lot of clay in the soil, it must be fertilized with compounds containing humus. And in the spring, during digging, the following list of fertilizers is added per square meter:

• 10 kg of humus;
• 300 g of ash;
• 2 buckets of peat and river sand;
• about 4 kg of sawdust;
• 2 tablespoons of nitrophosphate;
• 1 tablespoon superphosphate.

The sandy soil is also to be fertilized, a guideline for nutritious feeding. You will need to make per m 2:

• 2 buckets of land with turf peat;
• a tablespoon of nitrophosphate and superphosphate;
• a bucket of sawdust and humus.

When sowing seeds, you need to add wood ash, it will protect carrots from fungal diseases, and also provide seedlings with valuable nutrition. If the carrot has to be sent to acidic soil (it is clear that it does not fit, but there are no other options), you can do the following: treat the soil with fluff, a glass per m 2. You can take wood ash, dolomite flour or chalk instead of fluff. The soil is limed strictly in the fall, but fertilizer is applied in the spring for digging.

Before planting carrots in peat soil per m2, add:

• 5 kg of coarse sand;
• 3 kg of humus;
• a bucket of clay soil;
• 1 teaspoon sodium nitrate
• 1 tablespoon of superphosphate and potassium chloride.

It is definitely worth starting from this point for those who already have not the most successful experience in growing carrots. The following errors can be considered typical:

• if the stones were not removed from the ground before the start of the season, the root crops will not grow even, and the crooked carrot does not have a presentation;
• if you overdo it with nitrogen-containing dressing, carrots are likely to grow tasteless and taste bitter;
• if fresh manure is used, seedlings will be especially vulnerable to rot;
• if you abuse organic matter, the tops will be vigorously developed, but the root crops will be "horny", crooked, the harvested crop will not survive the winter, it will quickly deteriorate;
• it is pointless to add lime and fertilizers to open ground at the same time, these compounds neutralize each other's actions;
• acidic soil and sweet root crops are incompatible concepts.

Finally, one of the biggest mistakes in growing carrots is non-observance of crop rotation. If this is not taken into account, all other efforts may be in vain. Carrots, on the other hand, are a crop that depletes the land quite a lot. And if you plant it in depleted soil, you can not expect a harvest from such an experiment. It is good to plant carrots in the soil where cabbage, onions, nightshade and pumpkin grew before it. But if parsley and beans grew there, carrots will not follow. Reuse of one carrot patch is only permissible after 4 years.

Otherwise, it is not so difficult to tinker with the plant: watering should be moderate, because this culture does not tolerate either dryness or waterlogging. Over-spilling the soil when the carrot has long roots can crack and even rot. That is, watering should be done regularly, but not often. And before harvesting, watering, according to experienced gardeners, should be abandoned altogether. By the way, carrots have a peculiarity - they are planted with seeds, which means that it is almost impossible to predict the distance between plants. Sometimes thickening is noted, the plants interfere with the development of each other: the carrot grows small, thin, poorly stored. Therefore, it is worth thinning it out about the 12th day after germination, and then another 10 days later.