During the preparation for the new season, summer residents pay special attention to the choice of containers for growing seedlings. Even experienced gardeners often wonder what type of containers is better, which will provide the perfect result, in which pots the plants will be strong and healthy. And often the fundamental choice is between plastic and peat.
Peat pots and tablets
Use peat pots for this purpose is not recommended, because they quickly take moisture from the inside and dry up — they are difficult to keep moderately dry or sufficiently moist soil. The main advantage of such containers is that the seedlings are planted in the garden directly in the Cup, and the roots are not damaged. But the fact remains: pepper roots are difficult to germinate through the wall of the pot, and this delays the development of the plant.
Recently, a method of growing seedlings by sowing in peat blocks or peat tablets (large) has become widespread, which are then placed in a permanent place, while the roots are not injured.
Variants of homemade seedling tanks
It is good to sow pepper seeds in paper cylinders without a bottom. Make them easy: fold in 3-4 layers of a sheet of newspaper, screw on a half-liter bottle, staple the upper and lower ends of the resulting tube (or wear two rubber bands), so that the cylinder does not unfold. In the lower part it is good to put a little sphagnum moss. Fill the soil cylinder and can sow seeds. To bend the bottom edge, to make holes on the sides there is no need, such a glass is already excellent without a bottom, it does not fall apart. All cylinders from Newspapers compose take a careful to each other in shallow capacity, for example in Bank from-under herring.
Plant on place together with newspaper (naturally, by lifting the paper clips or gum) – paper in soil quickly wet and is spreading, not hampering growth underground parts of. Roots with such a transplant are not damaged at all. The only thing you need to pay attention to-you can not use colored Newspapers.
You can make a sleeve of dense polyethylene 10-12 cm wide, stapling the edges with a stapler, then cut it into cylinders about 20 cm high and fill them with soil. When transplanting such containers are put in the hole and cut the film on them. It is removed, and then fill the hole around the seedlings with soil. All these techniques allow you to grow pepper without picking, which he does not tolerate.
Sowing in plastic pots
A good result is sowing pepper seeds immediately in plastic flower pots with a capacity of 1 liter. Place three seeds at a distance of 1-2 cm from each other, placing them in a triangle in the center of the pot. This makes it possible to do without picking, that is, without transplantation at an early, most vulnerable age. If there are several plants, leave only one-the strongest. The rest should be cut with nail scissors at the soil level. When it comes time to transplant to a permanent place, the plant in a liter pot has a fairly large and well-developed root system, and therefore transfers the transplant easier.
There are, of course, failures, when only one weak seedling rises or none at all, despite the fact that in the next pot three have risen and all are strong. I really want in this case to transplant a strong sprout into an empty container. This should not be done, because when transplanting, you will damage both the plant that you transplant and the one that will remain in your pot: the root system of pepper is broken very easily, this can happen even when loosening and weeding.
Features of growing seedlings
Pepper has a compact root system, however, it should not be planted in too small containers. The volume of the glass should be at least 0.5 l, and even better 1 l. in a small space, the root system is twisted into a ball and after transplanting into place for a long time does not grow deep and wide.
Sometimes pepper seedlings are damaged by aphids. This happens in the following cases:
- when used for growing seedlings of soil from the greenhouse,
- when buying contaminated finished soil (it should be steamed),
- if you have houseplants in the same room as the seedlings.
To deal with aphids on the peppers is very difficult. You can, of course, just wash off the insects with soapy water or potassium permanganate solution of bright pink color, but this will have to be done every 4-5 days. Spray the seedlings with one of the biological preparations.