In winter, fresh vegetables are especially appreciated. At this time, there are not enough vitamins and the human body needs to compensate for them. Tomatoes can be successfully grown in a room on the windowsill for almost a year.
Tomatoes grow fast. Flower buds, depending on which variety of tomatoes you choose, appear within 40-50 days after germination, and after 20-25 days flowering begins.
For your information!
✔ In a room, a tomato can be grown even in two terms. To get an early harvest before May 1, seeds are sown in late January or early February. The second growing period is autumn-winter, with sowing seeds in the first decade of July and fruiting in late November and early December.
Choosing the right temperature and lighting
Tomatoes are thermophilic plants. The optimum air temperature for them is +20...+25°С on sunny days, +15...+18°С at night and +20...+25°С on the soil surface. With the beginning of fruit formation and fruit filling, the temperature at night should be + 18 ... + 21 ° С.
Lower or higher temperatures adversely affect the growth and development of plants. When the air is cold (+10...+12°C), the fruits are not formed, and the heat impairs their pollination.
Tomatoes are also demanding on light. Pots or wooden boxes should be placed in well-lit areas of the room, with windows facing south.
The brighter the light, the higher the air temperature should be (+20...+25°C during the day). On the short days of November, December and January, additional lighting of plants should be carried out 6-10 hours a day with greenhouse lamps or fluorescent lamps. The more intense the lighting, the better the set and the faster the fruits ripen.
Features of watering tomatoes
Compared with cucumbers, tomatoes are less demanding on soil and air moisture, they do not tolerate a lack, and even worse an excess of moisture. With a lack of moisture, ovaries and flowers fall on plants.
To prevent this, tomatoes should be watered regularly, and the soil should not dry out, especially during the formation and ripening of fruits. In cloudy weather, watering is limited. For the formation of 1 kg of fruit, plants consume up to 120 liters of water.
Tomatoes also tolerate dry air in the room well, so the plants are not sprayed with water from a spray bottle. As self-pollinating plants, they need dry room air.
We prepare containers and soil mixture for growing tomatoes in a room
The best tomatoes grow on windowsills on the south and southeast sides. You can grow them in pottery pots, plastic buckets, old pots, wooden boxes. However, it should be remembered that at the bottom there must be a hole for draining excess water. A plastic tray or bowl is placed under each vessel.
WE PLANT SEEDLINGS!!! Before planting the seedlings in the chosen container, a layer of crushed brick or coarse sand 3–5 cm high is poured for drainage at the bottom. Only then is it filled with a nutrient mixture.
The soil mixture of tomatoes is prepared from humus and soddy soil, taken in equal proportions. To this you need to add a little washed river sand and rotted sawdust.
Add 1–2 cups of wood ash to a bucket of soil mixture with complete mineral fertilizer: 10–20 g of urea, 40–60 of superphosphate and 10–20 g of potassium sulfate.
How to sow tomato seeds for seedlings
Three or four days before sowing, boxes or other containers with soil mixture are watered for compaction and dried. Then the soil surface is leveled and grooves are made every 4–5 cm, with a depth of 0.5–1.5 cm.
Sprouted seeds are laid out in the grooves with tweezers, 2–4 cm apart, covered with a mixture or humus no more than 1 cm thick. The container is covered with plastic wrap or glass and placed in a warm place until the first single shoot appears.
How to prepare tomato seeds before sowing
Before sowing, tomato seeds are sorted and calibrated with a 5% sodium chloride solution, and also treated with a 1% solution of potassium permanganate (1 g per 0.5 cup of water) for 0.5 hours and washed in cold tap water. This is how prevention against viral diseases (mosaic and streak) is carried out.
In the future, for another day, the seeds are kept in a solution of boric acid (0.1 g per 0.2 l of water) or methylene blue at the same concentration, which accelerates germination and fruiting.
Before sowing, tomato seeds are germinated. To do this, they are placed in any dish, at the bottom of which there is a paper napkin or filter paper and moistened well, then they are covered and placed in a warm room. For 3-4 days, the seeds germinate and are ready for sowing.
Features of seedling care
When seedlings appear, boxes with seedlings are put on the windowsill closer to the light. At the same time, the temperature is maintained no higher than + 12 ... + 15 ° C during the day and + 10 ° C at night. In 5–7 days after mass shoots, the temperature is raised to +20...+25°C during the day and +10...15°C at night.
Seedlings are watered daily with warm rain or snow water. After 10 days, the seedlings are watered with a solution of ash (1 tablespoon per 1 liter of water), and after 7 days - with a 1% solution of potassium permanganate.
As soon as the cotyledon leaves appear, the seedlings are illuminated with fluorescent lamps, which are placed at a distance of 20–30 cm from the plants. Seedlings are also illuminated on cloudy days of January-February.
12–13 days after germination, one of the most developed plants is left in each pot, the rest is pulled out.
To speed up fruiting, plants are placed at night between window frames, while the inner frames are slightly opened into the room. This contributes to the earliest laying of the flower brush and an increase in the number of flowers on it.
As soon as one or two true leaves are formed on the plants, they are transplanted one by one into peat, film or paper pots with a diameter of 8–12 cm. A third of the roots are carefully torn off from the bottom of the seedling and transplanted to a depth of up to the cotyledons.
The soil is watered with warm water and pots with transplanted plants are placed in a shady place or shaded with paper from direct sunlight. The air temperature is currently maintained at +20°C.
After the seedlings have taken root, the pots are moved to a well-lit place, maintaining the air temperature during the day + 20 ° C, at night + 10 ... + 12 ° C. During the period of seedling care, a decrease in temperature and an increase in humidity are not allowed, this can lead to the development of the "black leg" disease. Humidity is maintained at 40–60%.
Feeding and watering tomatoes on the windowsill
Seedling plants are watered frequently, every 3–7 days, depending on the condition of the soil in the morning, so that there is no high humidity at night. The water temperature for irrigation should be 1–2 ° C higher than the air temperature (water with chlorine requires settling).
After 10–12 days, the seedlings are fed, preferably with mullein, which is bred in 8 parts of water, or bird droppings, diluted 12 times. A glass of solution is distributed into 4 pots.
The second time, top dressing is carried out after 8–10 days with fertilizers of the same concentration, but a glass of solution is distributed into two pots. The third time the seedlings are fed 5-6 days before planting on a permanent "bed".
To prevent the development of late blight, seedlings are sprayed with a 1% solution of Bordeaux mixture. The fruits are harvested as they ripen.
