Perhaps all summer residents grow cucumbers. And this is not without reason, cucumbers are very healthy and dietary vegetables, which are 95% water. Some sow cucumber seeds first for seedlings, and then transplant the already formed plants into greenhouses, hotbeds or beds.
However, you can plant cucumber seeds directly in greenhouses. With proper care, the harvest of these vegetables does not fall and there is much less trouble with seedlings.
Sowing seeds directly in greenhouses allows you to get an early harvest. But in order to enjoy the greens as early as possible, it is better not to delay sowing.
The best days for planting cucumbers
You need to focus on the timing of planting seeds in a greenhouse depending on the climate and weather conditions of a particular spring. Most often, this method of growing cucumbers is used by residents of the southern regions. There, you can sow seeds in a polycarbonate greenhouse or in hotbeds as early as mid-April. In central Russia, the dates are pushed back to late April - early May, and in Siberia - to mid-May. Here, it is important to focus on the air temperature outside and, most importantly, in the greenhouse.
Important! At night, the thermometer in the greenhouse should not fall below +10 +12 degrees, and during the day, a comfortable temperature for cucumbers is 23-25 degrees above zero.
How to prepare seeds for planting in a greenhouse
An important step before sowing seeds in a greenhouse is their processing and preparation. Experts strongly advise against sowing unprocessed seeds, as this will negatively affect not only their germination, but also the growth and development of future plants.
To get powerful and healthy plants that will produce a high yield, you need to choose the right varieties. In a greenhouse, it is recommended to choose hybrids for growing rather than varieties. It is quite easy to distinguish them - there is an "F1" designation on the packs. It is better not to use seeds of ordinary varieties for sowing - the harvest will not be very good, since they need bees for pollination, and, as you know, there are not very many of them in a polycarbonate greenhouse.
Having selected the varieties, you should prepare them for sowing. First of all, the planting material needs to be checked for germination. This can be done with a saline solution. It is easy to prepare - you need to dissolve 10 grams of salt in one glass of warm water. Then mix everything well (the salt should dissolve completely) and pour the seeds into the solution. After a few minutes, see what happened. The seeds that settled to the bottom of the glass are good, they can be used for sowing. But the seeds that floated to the surface are not suitable for planting. The likelihood that they will sprout is low, and even if they do, the plants will be weak.
After this procedure, it is necessary to select all the seeds that have sunk in the saline solution and be sure to process them. To do this, you will need a solution of potassium permanganate. The seeds need to be kept in it for half an hour.
This is not the end of the work on preparing the seeds for sowing. The last stage remains - germination. Wet gauze is laid out in a shallow dish (it must be folded in several layers). Then the seed material is laid out on one half of the gauze and covered with the other half of the gauze. All this is left alone for several days. In 5-7 days at most, the seeds will hatch. The sprouted grains can already be sown in the greenhouse.
How to plant cucumbers in a greenhouse with seeds
It is necessary to plant already sprouted cucumber seeds in polycarbonate greenhouses correctly. Only sowing according to all the rules will help gardeners get a good harvest of these healthy and tasty vegetables.
First of all, you should pay attention to the temperature inside the greenhouse. Optimal conditions are +10+12 degrees at night and 20-22 degrees above zero during the day. The soil for future plantings also needs to be prepared in advance, preferably in the fall. Over the winter, the soil will settle, and many pests will die in it. Cucumbers are very capricious plants; they do not grow and bear fruit well on all types of soil. Therefore, it is recommended to take turf soil and humus (in equal parts), mix them and add a little more sawdust to this substrate.
Since not everyone has turf soil on their plot, the soil can be prepared from other components: mix cultivated peat, humus and field soil (all in equal parts). If possible, you can also add a very small amount of sawdust to the finished soil mixture.
Fertilizers should be added to both the first and second soil substrates so that the young plants have something to eat at first. For each square meter of soil before planting, add 15 grams of potassium sulfate, 3 grams of nitrate (ammonium) and another 25 grams of superphosphate. All this is thoroughly mixed and leveled with a rake. Before planting seeds in the greenhouse, it is also recommended to treat it from pests. Moreover, not only the soil needs to be treated, but also the polycarbonate, as well as all the structures of the greenhouse. It is better to treat with special preparations. They will destroy a large number of pests, pathogenic fungi and microbes.
As soon as the soil is ready and the greenhouse itself is processed, you can start sowing the seeds. In the greenhouse, make holes at a distance of 40-50 centimeters from each other. You can’t make holes more often, otherwise when the plants grow, they will experience discomfort - there will not be enough nutrition, water, sunlight. As a result, all this will affect the harvest. There is no need to add anything to the holes when planting, since the soil was prepared in advance and all the necessary fertilizers are already in it.
As a rule, one, two or, in extreme cases, three seeds are sown in each hole. This is done in order to ultimately choose the strongest and healthiest plant from all. If you sow only one seed, it may not sprout at all. Then you will have to sow again, and this will postpone the time of receiving the first vegetables.
Important! Seeds should be planted to a depth of two centimeters, but not deeper. Otherwise, the shoots will appear much later.
It is better to plant cucumber seeds in sunny weather, and in the first half of the day. After sowing, the holes are watered abundantly. If the weather is dry and hot, then watering before germination can be done every other day, in extreme cases - every two days. It is impossible to say exactly how many days the cucumbers will sprout. Everything will depend on the weather conditions and how well the greenhouse has warmed up. Usually, in good weather, sprouts of sprouted cucumbers can appear already on the third day after sowing. If the seeds are sown without treatment and have not sprouted, then you can wait for sprouts from 7 to 10 days.
If even slight frosts (up to -2 degrees) occur at night in the area, it is recommended to additionally cover the holes in the evening with film or covering material. And if the temperature drops below -2 degrees, the plantings should be covered first with covering material, and then with two layers of polyethylene film.
Keep the covering material ready until the threat of recurrent frosts has completely passed.
Caring for cucumbers after germination: step-by-step recommendations
After germination, cucumbers need attention and care more than ever. These are capricious and picky plants that can react to both a lack of nutrients in the soil and low or too high air temperatures for them. However, growing them is not difficult if you follow the correct agricultural technology.
Seedlings need to be watered often, especially abundantly in a greenhouse, since no precipitation gets into it. Watering is done often, preferably every other day, but in hot weather you can give water to the plants even every day. It is recommended to water with warm water heated in the sun. It is best to water in the evening, but no later than 18 hours. At least half a bucket of water (five liters) is poured into each hole for young plants; when the plants are large, the watering rate is increased exactly twice — up to ten liters of water per bush.
You will also have to feed the cucumbers, otherwise the harvest will be small. The first feeding is done when the plants already have three true leaves (cotyledons are not leaves). The first feeding must necessarily contain nitrogen. It is extremely necessary for young plants at the very beginning of their growth. Urea or ammonium nitrate is suitable for this. If it is urea, then one tablespoon of this fertilizer is added to 10 liters of water, mixed thoroughly and watered at the rate of two liters of solution per plant. If you use ammonium nitrate (calcium nitrate is not suitable in this case), then the consumption rate increases to two spoons per 10 liters of water. In this case, two liters of solution are also poured onto each plant.
Plants growing in a greenhouse also need shaping, like tomatoes. They should never be pinched, as their main harvest will be concentrated on the main stem. All side shoots should be removed, as they will take away a large amount of nutrients from the plants. The plants are tied up with twine, which is twisted into a figure eight and tied to the top of the greenhouse. The lower part of the twine is attached to the plant, but not too tightly. As the plants grow, they are simply pushed through the twine (as it is folded into a figure eight) and they themselves grow upward. Bamboo poles are gaining popularity among gardeners. They are up to 2.5 meters high. The poles are installed next to the holes before planting the plants. Then the grown cucumbers are attached to the poles (you can use plastic fasteners, or pieces of twine). This is done constantly - approximately every 20-30 centimeters.
One feeding will not be enough for cucumbers. At least three feedings are needed throughout the summer. The second time, cucumbers are fed during the flowering phase. In this case, they also need nitrogen. Therefore, we again use urea or saltpeter in the same proportions. Recently, many gardeners try not to use chemical fertilizers on their plots. In this case, urea and saltpeter can be replaced with organic fertilizers or natural growth stimulants. Herbal infusion is a good choice. One liter of such fertilizer is diluted with nine liters of clean water and two liters of solution are poured onto one plant. The third feeding of cucumbers is given during the beginning of their fruiting. This time they are fed with phosphorus and potassium (two spoons per 10 liters of water). By the way, between the second and third feedings, cucumbers can also be fed with an infusion of black bread. Two liters of the infusion are mixed in five liters of water. Two liters of this ecological fertilizer are also poured onto each plant.
How to properly plant cucumbers in a greenhouse with seeds
Planting cucumbers in a greenhouse with seeds is not much different from planting cucumber seeds in polycarbonate greenhouses. In this case, the plants will grow under film shelters, but all care for them will be the same as for cucumbers growing in greenhouse conditions.
Important! You cannot grow cucumbers every year in the same place. Since pests and diseases remain in the beds and the harvest falls.
Observe crop rotation in the garden. In addition, experienced gardeners recommend that beginners carefully select seed material in garden markets or specialty stores. The choice of seeds has recently been huge. However, not all varieties and hybrids are suitable for a certain area. In the northern regions, it is advisable to grow early ripening varieties of cucumbers. They can yield a harvest as early as the 40th day after germination.
On average, cucumbers begin to bear fruit on the 50-55th day after full shoots. Add another week to this number of days for shoots and as a result we get the approximate date when the plants will please with their first crispy and tasty fruits.