What green manure to choose for potatoes?

An excellent harvest is the dream of every gardener. However, the real owner does not choose all means in the struggle for the harvest. Most summer residents, caring about the harvest, still try to use as little as possible. chemical fertilizers. Vegetables grown on your own plot should be tasty and healthy.

Plan:

1. What are green manures?
2. Types of uses of green manure
3. Green manure for potatoes
4. How to sow green manure for potatoes
5. The effect of using green manure

The more valuable a vegetable is in the eyes of a gardener, the more concern there is about its yield. The potato harvest is especially important, a vegetable whose cultivation is a very labor-intensive process. That’s why it’s so important to get a good harvest from a small plot. One of the environmentally friendly ways to increase potato yields is to plant green manure.

What are green manures?

Green manures are plants that significantly improve the soil and help increase productivity. These useful plants are sown after harvesting in the fall or early spring before planting the main crop. The green manure is allowed to grow and then plowed into the ground. This must be done before flowering, because young plants decompose faster.

Decaying green manure enrich the soil various micro and macroelements: nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus and others. At the same time, the activity of soil microorganisms is also activated. However, you need to pay attention to the amount of green mass. If there is too much of it, then the green manure will not decompose, but will turn sour.

Types of uses of green manure

Green manure can be used in different ways. There are complete, mowing and fall-off fertilizers using green manure. When fully fertilized, the entire green mass is embedded in the soil (no deeper than 10 centimeters). In the backward method, they only use roots, and plant stems are mowed and removed. This grass clippings is used as fertilizer in another area. In this case, they talk about mowing fertilizer.

Video: Green manure

Green manure for potatoes

Potatoes need phosphorus and nitrogen most of all. Therefore, the best green manures for this vegetable will be legumes: peas, vetch, lupine, sweet clover, alfalfa. The effect of these plants on the earth is similar to the effect of manure. However, green manure decomposes in the soil much faster than manure. In addition, much less green manure needs to be added to the ground than manure.

You can use other green manure before planting potatoes: rapeseed, mustard, rapeseed, phacelia, oats, wheat, rye. These plants will protect the soil from being blown away and washed away and enrich it with some microelements. However, they will not release nitrogen during decomposition, which is important for potatoes microelement. Therefore, with this choice, the yield will be significantly less than when using legumes as green manure.

But some of these plants (phacelia and white mustard) repel pests, such as wireworm, which potato lovers often have to fight. But rye and wheat improve the structure of the soil, suppress the growth of weeds, but at the same time serve as excellent food for wireworms.

How to sow green manure for potatoes

Green manure should be sown only in well-cultivated soil.If this condition is neglected, then valuable plants will not be able to produce a sufficient amount of green mass, which means that there will be little benefit from them.

Growing plants also need watering - a common requirement for good growth.

From 0.8 to 2 kilograms of seeds are usually sown per hectare of land. This should be done either a month and a half before the onset of cold weather, or in early May - late April. Green manure must be cut no later than two weeks before planting the main crop, because it must still have time to rot and enrich the soil. In addition, you need to have time to cut off green manure before seeds appear on them, otherwise, instead of benefit, they will cause harm, causing weed.

The effect of using green manure

Green manure is an excellent means of increasing productivity because they:
• enrich the soil with useful substances necessary for good potato growth;
• can even completely replace manure;
• improve the structure of the soil, making it looser and more moisture-absorbing;
• reliably protect the earth from erosion, blowing, and overheating;
• suppress the growth of weeds;
• help reduce the number of pests.

Video: Green manure in the garden. Natural farming

Experienced summer residents understand that green manure is an excellent weapon in the fight for the harvest. Their skillful use helps the soil maintain fertility and nourish the vegetables that the summer resident grows on his plot. The earth always responds gratefully to such care for it and allows you to collect excellent harvests even on a small summer cottage.