The rules of growing spinach in pots on the windowsill

As you know, spinach is just a warehouse of vitamins, different minerals, vegetable protein and fiber. But most of all in this culture contains iron, and well-digested. Very useful eating spinach for kids, spinach helps to restore strength as well and people who have suffered long-term illness. It is used in food and fresh, boiled, stewed, and canned. But the most useful thing is still fresh spinach, the heat treatment is still a certain percentage of nutrients, but is lost. How to grow spinach in the ground, see the article: "the Spinach – growing useful greens"

In some pots to grow
In order to grow spinach on the windowsill of the pots is not necessary, here, amiss, and plastic and plastic and clay pots. You can also use wooden boxes with a height of 15 – 20 cm the Main thing is to calculate the area of nutrition: as a rule, a single plant of the desired size from 7x7 to 10x10 cm if you are going to gather leaves at a very young age, this area can be reduced to 5x5 cm
So the box for planting should be divided into squares of the required size, and you will see how many plants will feel comfortable in it.





Requirements to the soil
As substrate for cultivation of this culture we can take any ready-made potting mix, but before buying, please read the ingredients for growing spinach is not suitable for acidic soil. The composition should not be peat, it promotes acidic reactions in the soil. Let me remind you that in the conditions of greenhouses and open soil for normal growth and development of spinach requires highly fertile soil with neutral or slightly alkaline reaction.

For the cultivation of pot culture, you can prepare the soil mix yourself, and to do this, take 1 part of biohumus and 2 parts coconut fiber. The coconut fibers will hold moisture, avoiding stagnation of water in the pot. Don't forget to put on the bottom of the pot layer of expanded clay, it will be enough 2-3 cm

If you don't have coconut fiber and there is no way to buy it, it will be enough one of biohumus, for every 100 смᶾ of humus, add 2 teaspoons of perlite (of vermiculite). The addition of these substances will give your soil the same qualities that the use of fiber, but they do not rot, so the soil mix will last even longer.

Illumination
Spinach like all the early greens need long daylight, therefore, when growing on a windowsill in autumn and winter, the plants need supplementary lighting. It is easy to implement using fluorescent lamps. The total length of the photoperiod for this crop should not be less than 10 hours. Supplementary lighting is needed as well in cloudy weather. Also you can delay the onset of the flowering period in this culture, decrease the length of daylight will help you with this. But remember that the length of daylight is less than 8-9 hours leads to inhibition of plants.

Humidity

Spinach is quite hygrophilous, and in addition to regular watering he needs to maintain a high humidity
Plants wither and waste away at low humidity, so during the heating season it is recommended to spray them with a spray bottle, or put it around the tank with water.

Temperature mode
The culture of spinach does not require high temperatures, seeds germinate fine at +4 C. For further growth and development is considered permissible temperature below +8C, it is easy to arrange on the balcony even in winter. Ideal for development of this plant is temperature +15C, but it is important to observe the humidity of the air. The air temperature above +15 ° C leads to strelkovanie plants, and as you know the leaves become unfit for food.

Watering
When watering this culture important to avoid stagnant water, as it will lead to the development of rot and various fungal diseases. So you should take care of good drainage in the pot and make the bottom of the pot to drain excess water.

Planting it is best to choose for growing in windowsill conditions early ripening varieties. Here are a few popular varieties: Viroflay, Godri, Gigantic, Stoick.
For quick germination, the seeds should be soaked in warm water for a day, then they can withstand several hours in a weak solution of potassium permanganate, after promacot and lightly dry.

First, the seeds are sown in single seed box, after they need to swordplay. In the box make a shallow groove depth from 1 to 1.5 cm and lightly sprinkle the layer of soil and watered with spray. After sowing above the pot should be placed in the hotbed, or just cover with a plastic bag. After emergence, the cellophane should be removed.

Typically, seedlings emerge in 5-7 days. The plants remain in the seed boxes until the emergence of 2-3 true leaves, then they can dive into individual pots.

Pick the Spinach easily carries the pick in a permanent place, and the particular difficulties it will not cause
Pots with seedlings well-watered and one by one, slowly and carefully remove the young plants, the main thing is not to damage the roots. After removing the plants planted in a permanent place and thoroughly watered.

Care of plants in the conditions of the sill
Special care spinach on the windowsill is not required. The main measures are watering, spraying and adjusting the lighting.
Need to be watered as the drying of soil and to prevent water stagnation. Spraying should if the apartment or room where there are tanks with spinach, dry air, as from time to time to cover the pots with plastic bags to create a hotbed, so you will retain the humidity of soil and air.





Adjusting the illumination can be prytinyayuchy plants, it is necessary to avoid flowering.

As a rule, the plant is suitable to harvest for 2-3 months until the release flower arrow. You can organize a real pipeline, podsela plants every month. Only in this case it should be remembered that spinach needs a fertile soil.

Therefore, if you are planted the following seedlings in the same soil don't forget to add fertilizer, you can use any compound plant fertilizer.

Harvesting can be carried out with the appearance of a good 5-6 adult leaves or to achieve a plant height 7 – 10 cm.



Source: www.art-pen.ru