How to grow high-yielding spring beets? Plus the 2020 production technical guidance!
Affected by the pandemic, people will vigorously develop planting and breeding this year to avoid food shortages later on, and now is the time to plant beets, so how do you grow high-yielding spring beets? How should pests and diseases be controlled?
1. Introduction to beets:
1. What do beets look like?
Beet is a plant of the Chenopodiaceae family. The main cultivated varieties include sugar beet, leaf beet, root beet, and fodder beet; today we are mainly looking at root beet, that is, the edible beet; its edible part is the beet tuber. Edible beet can not only be cooked and eaten, but also has outstanding medical and health benefits. It is neutral in nature and slightly cool, and has the effect of strengthening the spleen and aiding digestion, as well as resolving phlegm and relieving cough. At the same time, beetroot is also an important medicine for treating blood, and has the reputation of the “root of life.”
2. Where is beet suitable for planting?
Beet is widely planted in temperate and cold temperate regions, while in warm regions it is planted in the cool season.
2. How do you grow high-yielding spring beets?
1. Pre-sowing preparation
Prepare the land in a timely manner, requiring the ground to be level, the soil broken up, the field clean, and the soil firm, to meet the needs of different cultivation models. Conduct soil closed treatment 1-2 days before sowing, and 96% S-metolachlor emulsifiable concentrate can be used to control field weeds. Prepare pelletized single-grain good seed with a germination rate above 95%.
2. Sowing and seedbed management
(1) Mechanical precision direct sowing cultivation model. Use precision seeding machinery for sowing, requiring straight sowing rows, neat starts and stops, consistent depth, and uniform soil covering. The sowing depth should preferably be 2-3 cm, and it should not be too deep. If the soil in the plot is too loose before sowing, first press it down. When sowing, inspect while sowing to avoid missed sowing and prevent gaps in the rows. Immediately after sowing, carry out the first drip irrigation, with a drip irrigation amount of about 30 cubic meters per mu, to ensure seedling emergence. After the seedlings are complete, if weeds are serious, chemical weed control is needed, and when the beet has grown 6-8 leaves, carry out field intertillage and weeding and other management work. For plots sown by grabbing soil moisture, if early spring windy weather occurs, methods such as adding drip irrigation tape to divert water or moving sprinkler irrigation equipment should be used to replenish water in time to ensure full seedlings.
(2) Mechanical film-mulching drip irrigation under film cultivation model. Sow in spring when the ground temperature at 5 cm remains stable above 5°C for 5 consecutive days. The requirements for sowing and the first drip irrigation are the same as for the mechanical precision direct sowing cultivation model. After the beet reaches the 8-leaf stage, carry out one thorough irrigation so that the leaf cluster quickly becomes luxuriant. After sowing, pay attention to field seedling inspection. If insect pests occur, spray pesticides in time to improve the beet seedling survival rate.
(3) Paper tube seedling transplanting cultivation model
Choose a site sheltered from the wind and facing the sun, with higher terrain, flat ground, and good drainage as the seedling site, build a plastic greenhouse, and if the area is small, a small arch shed can be used. Choose fertile topsoil from wheat stubble, corn stubble, or potato stubble land that has not grown beet for more than 5 years as seedling soil. The seedling soil must have no herbicide residue and relatively few weed seeds, and saline-alkali soil, clay soil, raw soil, and sandy soil must be avoided. Mix 300 kg of seedbed soil with 2 kg of special seedbed fertilizer evenly. The seedbed should be raised with soil by more than 10 cm and be level and rolled firm. Absolutely do not use an “underground or semi-underground bed” for seedling raising.
Seven days after sowing, the seedlings emerge completely. Pay attention to heat preservation, keeping the temperature inside the shed at 25-30°C during the day and above 10°C at night. If the temperature is too high, ventilate in time to prevent high temperature from burning the sprouts, oxygen deficiency in the shed, and excessive humidity causing damping-off disease. Try not to water the seedbed; use sprinkler irrigation inside the shed to spray 25-degree warm water for moistening. When the seedling age reaches 30-35 days, it can be transplanted. Water before transplanting so that the seedbed has enough moisture and the paper tubes separate easily; 4-5 days before transplanting, spray the leaves with a 0.2% potassium dihydrogen phosphate aqueous solution; spray the seedbed with a 2000-fold dilution of 2.5% deltamethrin to prevent pest damage after the seedlings are transplanted to the field.
3. Pest and disease prevention and control at the seedling stage
During the seedling growth stage, as the temperature rises, field weeds multiply and pests and diseases begin to occur, so prevention and control must be carried out in time.
(1) Control damping-off disease. For the mechanical precision direct sowing cultivation model, spray control can be used; for the drip irrigation under film cultivation model, pesticide can be applied with water; for the paper tube seedling cultivation model, spray the seedbed with a 4000-5000-fold dilution of 95% hymexazol, or use 8-16 grams of 50% thiram wettable powder mixed with 35 kg of water for spraying.
(2) Prevent and control insect pests. After seedling emergence, promptly prevent and control beet weevils, white grubs, and cutworms. Before sowing in the field, in plots with severe underground pests such as white grubs, mix insecticidal granules evenly with fertilizer and apply before direct sowing. After sowing in the field, if beet weevils, white grubs, and cutworms are found to be seriously harmful at the seedling stage, use targeted root drenching and spraying for control, or scatter poison bait between rows. For the paper tube seedling cultivation model, poison bait can be scattered on the surrounding soil in the seedling shed, or spray control can be used on the seedbed. Per mu, the pesticide can be 1.5-2 kg of 10% chlorpyrifos granules, or 1.5-3 kg of 3% phoxim granules, or 1.5-2 kg of 5% carbosulfan granules, or 2-3 kg of 8% chlorpyrifos-phoxim granules.
(3) Weed control at the seedling stage. Before the weeds reach the 3-4 leaf stage, use 400 ml per mu of 16% beetanning emulsion for soil spraying. One week later, 350-400 ml per mu of 21% anningyifuhuang + 100 ml per mu of 20% sethoxydim emulsifiable concentrate or 30-35 ml per mu of 10.8% haloxyfop-R-methyl emulsifiable concentrate can be used again for spray control of weeds.
Overall, to achieve high beet yields, in addition to doing pre-land-preparation work well, you also need to handle the seeds properly, and after emergence, do a good job with water and fertilizer, weeding, and pest and disease control.