How to Plant Tomato Seeds? A Detailed Guide to the Suitable Planting Seasons
Tomato is one of the important vegetable crops in China's production and cultivation, and the current tomato planting area is constantly expanding, so how do you plant tomato seeds? What season is suitable for planting?
1. What season is suitable for planting tomatoes?
If grown in open fields, tomatoes have very high seasonal requirements; tomatoes can only grow and mature in summer. The sowing period is usually from March to May, using seedling transplanting, with field planting in April to May. However, tomatoes grown in greenhouses can grow all year round.
Specific reference: In plain areas, the sowing period for spring planting is from the end of December to February, for autumn planting from early July to August, and for winter planting from October to early November. For off-season cultivation in summer, a location with an altitude above 400 m should be selected.
2. How do you plant tomato seeds?
1. Seed and plot treatment
Expose the seeds to sunlight for one to two days to reduce the number of pathogens on the seeds and ensure the seed germination rate. After sunning the seeds, they also need to be disinfected with a carbendazim solution.
The plot for sowing tomatoes should be level, sunny, close to a water source, and sheltered from the wind. The soil should be deep, loose and fertile loam rich in organic matter, and the previous crop should preferably be rice. Continuous cropping with Solanaceae crops, tobacco, peanuts, etc. should be avoided. Sandy soil is prone to bacterial wilt and is not suitable.
2. Sowing methods
Generally, sowing in a seedbed or sowing in nutrient cups can be used.
(1) Sowing in a seedbed
The seedbed should be chosen where the previous crop was rice. Raising seedlings in nutrient cups has a good effect and is very effective against bacterial wilt. After field planting, the plants also grow relatively well and yields are high; the disadvantage is that it is relatively labor-intensive.
(2) Sowing in nutrient cups
The soil for nutrient cups can use the following formula: rice soil or burnt soil or subsoil from below 50 cm of the surface, decomposed livestock and poultry manure, and plant ash in a ratio of 6:2:2, with a small amount of compound fertilizer added (recommended amount is 0.2% of the nutrient weight).
Before sowing, thoroughly wet the seedbed or the soil in the nutrient cups. Sow one seed per cup; when sowing in the seedbed, sow as thinly as possible. After sowing, cover lightly with soil, then cover with rice straw. Use a watering can to moisten it every day, just enough to ensure sprouting.
3. Field management
(1) Watering
Tomatoes have a well-developed root system and strong absorption capacity, and their stems and leaves are lush with strong transpiration, so they need a fair amount of water, but they do not require large amounts of irrigation. Especially during the seedling stage and early flowering stage, too much water will cause the seedlings to grow leggy and affect fruiting.
(2) Temperature
The most suitable growth temperature for tomatoes is 20-25°C. When the temperature is below 10°C, the plants stop growing; when the temperature is above 35°C, reproductive growth is disturbed and damaged.
(3) Light
Most tomato varieties flower earlier under 11-13 hours of sunlight, and the plants grow robustly, while growth is best under 16 hours of light.
(4) Disease prevention
Tomatoes mainly need prevention against fusarium wilt and viral disease.
Fusarium wilt: This disease is the main disease at this time, is devastating, and must be a key focus of prevention and control.
Viral disease: High temperature and dry conditions in the environment, zinc and silicon deficiency in plants, and insect transmission are the conditions for a major outbreak of viral disease. Therefore, rational application of zinc fertilizer and silicon fertilizer, avoiding high temperature and dryness, and eliminating disease-transmitting insects are the main preventive measures.