Growing cucumbers in a greenhouse in winter

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The cultivation of cucumbers in the greenhouse in the winter has long been used on an industrial scale and is gaining popularity among summer residents. There are varieties bred specifically for cultivation in regions with a cold climate for winter fruiting. The technology for growing cucumbers in a greenhouse or hotbed in winter with sufficient heating has been successful worldwide.

Content
  1. Greenhouse design requirements
  2. Foundation and framework
  3. Roof
  4. Entrance
  5. Heating the greenhouse and ventilation
  6. Heating <
  7. Ventilation <
  8. Equipping the greenhouse with lighting
  9. Soil preparation
  10. Soil <
  11. Suitable varieties
  12. Advantages
  13. Seed preparation
  14. Calibration <
  15. Processing
  16. Warming up <
  17. Hardening
  18. Stimulation
  19. Planting and leaving
  20. Proper fit and optimal
  21. mode
  22. Watering <
  23. Fertilizing <
  24. Shrub formation
  25. Harvesting

Выращивание огурцов зимой в теплице

Growing cucumbers in the winter in the greenhouse

Construction requirements greenhouse

For the winter cultivation of cucumbers, the greenhouse must meet a number of requirements:

  • proper heating of the soil and air,
  • correct moisture indicators,
  • the presence of an artificial light source,
  • fertile loose earth.

Such conditions for growing cucumbers in winter provide greenhouses made of glass or polycarbonate.Greenhouses covered with a film over the entire width are not suitable for winter cultivation of vegetable crops: the film coating is fragile and the structure sags during heavy snowfalls, the snow accumulates on the film and may collapse at any time.

Foundation and frame

If you design the right greenhouse for growing cucumbers in winter, it is better to use a solid concrete foundation as the basis. Structures deepened in the soil, act as an additional natural insulation.

The height of the greenhouse is selected so as to comply with the proportions of the crop area and volume 2: 1.

Frame can be made from a wooden base or metal pipes. The greenhouses with double frames and a slope of the wall on the south side showed the greatest efficiency and ease of use.

Roof

The greenhouse roof is made of the same material as the whole greenhouse. Its slope is determined by the angle of the sun. The most suitable option would be the passage of sunlight at a right angle at noon.

Entrance

It is advisable to enter the winter greenhouse through a small vestibule. This will protect the cucumber bushes from a sharp influx of cold air. The tambour can also serve as an utility room, where the water storage and heating equipment are located.

Greenhouse heating and ventilation

A properly assembled structure must be equipped with ventilation and heating systems in order to grow cucumbers in winter at the required optimal mode.

Heating

When planning a heating system for a greenhouse for growing cucumbers in winter, you need to remember that this vegetable crop does not tolerate excessively dry air, therefore, convectors, metal stoves and oil heaters are not used as heat sources in the greenhouse. One of the suitable heating options in winter is a water heating system through pipes laid in the soil. The air is heated by radiators or registers stretched around the greenhouse perimeter.

If you have a home heating system near the greenhouse, you can attach the greenhouse to it.

Для обогрева растений не подойдут печки и конвекторы

Stoves and convectors

are not suitable for heating plants. It is recommended to use a stove for greenhouse heating systems or boiler. The boiler has more advantages in heating a winter greenhouse, because the boiler is much longer. Boilers for greenhouses are suitable gas, electric or solid fuel. When calculating the boiler capacity should be based on the fact that 10 square meters. m of a greenhouse with a height of up to 2.5 m requires 1 kW.

For an average greenhouse of 30-35 square meters.m suitable boiler equipment with a capacity of 4 kW.

Heating must be provided for the soil. This can be done in one of several ways.

Heating cable

As a heating element, a cable with polypropylene insulation made of galvanized steel wire with a polyester sheath with a diameter of up to 6 mm and a bending radius of about 35 mm is suitable . The linear power of the cables should not exceed 10 watts per 1 square. m of floor area so as not to dry the soil and roots of plants.

Subsoil pipes

A heating device with subsoil pipes can be made one of 2 possible options:

  • right in soil under the beds, laying them so that the soil layer above them is at least 20 cm, but no more than 25 cm,
  • under the shelves where the boxes with planted cucumber bushes are placed.

For heating, metal pipes with a diameter of 75-150 mm are suitable. Suppose a smaller diameter of the heating pipe, but then they will need to be laid more often.

Ventilation

The ventilation system is not made by analogy with a suitable for a summer greenhouse: through the windows the greenhouse is in winter do not air, as cucumber culture is afraid of drafts. The ventilation system for the winter greenhouse is designed by the supply and exhaust method from plastic pipes.

Equipping the greenhouse with lighting

Given the short daylight hours in the winter and low solar activity, additional artificial lighting will be required for cucumbers in the greenhouse in winter. They do this using different lamps, observing the illumination parameters and the color temperature according to the Kelvin temperature scale:

  • Cucumbers need light that is close to daylight in its characteristics, with a color temperature of 5.0 thousand ° K. With these parameters, luminescent, mercury (MGL), halogen (DNaT, DNaz) lamps are produced.
  • At the initial growth stage, it is recommended to use lamps with a cold color of 6.5 thousand ° K, at the flowering and fruiting stage – warm at 4.0 thousand ° K.

On the same area of ​​fluorescent bulbs will need more than metal halide. So, for lighting about 4 square meters. m of the greenhouse area, 1 DNaT lamp with a power of 40 W or 10 fluorescent lamps with a power of 54 W each is needed.

Modern lighting technologies produce special LED phyto-lamps with red-blue radiation, which can increase the growth rate in winter and intensify fruiting. With such lighting useful for plants, it is not recommended to work in the red-blue spectrum for a long time, since it adversely affects vision.

Soil preparation

Грядки важно правильно утеплить

Beds it is important to properly insulate

The beds in a winter greenhouse can be formed:

  • in the form of an insulated or heated duct,
  • in the form of a trench filled with decaying bioorganic.

Such beds protect cucumber bushes from freezing when they are properly insulated:

  • insulated beds are made using polystyrene or polyurethane insulation, which are laid out at the bottom of the boxes either trenches,
  • warm beds with bioorganics are initially filled with wood chocks and branches, dried leaves or straw, and only then they are covered with fertile soil from above, large branches and chocks are folded to the bottom and serve as drainage.

Soil

The most suitable soil for cucumbers in winter is loose, fertile, moderately moist. The required parameters are achieved by preparing the required soil. As part of the soil mixture should be:

  • sawdust from deciduous trees from last year – 1 bucket,
  • 2 buckets of humus and peat,
  • 1,5 cups of wood ash,
  • 150 g of nitrofoska or nitroammofoski.

Made in this amount of soil mix is ​​enough for a bed of 1.5 square meters. m of cultivated area 0.3 m high.

To disinfect the soil from bacterial infections and fungal diseases, the mixed components are watered with potassium permanganate and treated with phytosporin. After 2 days, the soil is poured with a solution of an EM preparation, which may be Baikal or Radiance. The soil is covered with film material for 7 days. This time is enough for the soil layers to be structured, bacteria to begin active development, developing a form assimilable by the cucumber culture.

Suitable varieties

Not all varietal varieties of cucumber culture are suitable for growing in the winter in the greenhouse.Varieties for cultivation in the greenhouse in winter must be selected taking into account the characteristics:

  • they must be self-pollinated, since in winter there are no pollinating insects in the greenhouse, otherwise, when growing bee pollinated varieties of cucumbers, you will have to pollinate the plants manually and plant bushes with male flowering giving pollen;
  • it is recommended to make the choice in favor of shade-tolerant varieties, since natural lighting in winter is minimal and artificial lighting differs from sunlight, as a result of wind-loving varieties will give low productivity,
  • it is required to choose varieties of cucumbers with high resistance to viruses and bacteria, as well as resistant to fungi, since it is difficult to create the required humidity in a winter greenhouse at a natural level, dry air due to systems heating is eliminated by frequent watering and spraying, which creates a favorable soil for the development of diseases,
  • in order to facilitate the work of forming cucumber bushes when thickening plantings, gardeners try to buy for growing in winter in a greenhouse with hybrids with small branching, which do not give rise to lateral stems, but wasting energy on the development of the main one. It’s convenient to tie them upright.

Advantages

Не все сорта пригодны для выращивания зимой

Not all varieties are suitable for growing in winter

When growing vegetables in a winter greenhouse, summer residents prefer to purchase hybrid seeds, which have several advantages over conventional varieties:

  • indicators yields higher by 30-40%,
  • adaptability to climate, humidity, soil type is 30-50% better compared to classic varieties,
  • increased resistance to pests, fungi, infections and bacteria,
  • accelerated deadlines with ripening,
  • the best consumer characteristics, such as presentation, keeping quality.

Among cucumber hybrids suitable for growing in a greenhouse in winter, Kurazh F1, Ant F1, Berendey F1 , Garland F1, Dynamite F1, Cheetah F1.

Seed preparation

Acquired cucumber seeds are carefully prepared before being planted in the greenhouse.

Calibration

In order to calibrate cucumber seeds at home, they are dipped for 10-15 minutes in a glass of cool water, where a small spoon of salt is dissolved. Seeds that have popped up are removed because they do not appear at all or give a weak plant that does not survive cultivation in winter. Good seed is washed.

Some gardeners are in no hurry to throw up the pop-up seeds, but they are dried and left for summer planting.

Many gardeners calibrate the seed material by size, selecting the largest and largest for planting

Processing

Disinfection is carried out to increase the resistance of plants to bacteria and is done by placing the seed in potassium permanganate or 3% hydrogen peroxide for 20-30 minutes.

Treatment against fungi is done by soaking the seeds for 2-3 hours in phytosporin, after which Seed material is washed and dried.

Warm

Heating the seeds is carried out as a preventive measure against viruses and to increase the number of female flowers. It is most convenient to do warming up in a thermos, pouring water at a temperature of about 60 ° C there. The seeds are kept lowered into a thermos for 4-8 hours.

Hardening

When growing cucumbers in the winter in the greenhouse, it is important how long the plants are able to tolerate temperature changes, whether they are able to withstand in cold weather. For hardening by winter, the seed material in a moistened paper towel on a saucer is placed on the lower shelf of the refrigerator for 2 days. There the temperature is set from 0 ° C to 2 ° C.

Stimulation

Рост растений можно стимулировать

Plant growth you can stimulate

This process accelerates the emergence of seedlings and activates the immune system of the vegetable culture. For stimulation use drugs Epin or Zircon. You can use the folk method with an aloe leaf cut along it, onto a slice of which seed material is laid, left overnight and planted in the morning without washing.

Planting and care

Plant cucumber the culture when grown in winter is conveniently right in the ground or in seedlings. When planting seedlings there is an advantage: you can choose the strongest among all seedlings. At the stage of occurrence of 2-3 leaves, they are fertilized with mineral compounds and after a few days the strongest seedlings are planted in the greenhouse.

Proper planting and optimal regime

Rules for growing cucumbers in the greenhouse in the winter, they require heated soil for planting cucumbers and prepared holes spilled with water and absorbed all the moisture. Seedlings are removed from the container along with the ground and placed in a hole at the level of cotyledonous leaves, sprinkled with soil.After planting, you must create the required microclimate for the vegetable culture according to the scheme indicated in the table:

Care

Caring for cucumbers in a winter greenhouse requires proper watering, fertilizing and forming bushes.

Watering

Watering cucumbers in a winter greenhouse is recommended by the drip method or by regular root watering. It is recommended to water the plants with settled water heated to 25 ° С-27 ° С, moistening 10 cm of soil with plenty of water. To reduce the amount of watering, the beds are mulched. As mulch, they use ripe sawdust, peat composition or straw.

Water can be softened with mullein or bird droppings of 5-10 ml per bucket of water.

Fertilizer

Often, infused mullein 1 to 5 or chicken droppings 1 to 15 are used to fertilize cucumbers.It will saturate the soil with potassium, calcium and other useful elements of ash.

Formation of bushes

In greenhouses, cucumbers try to grow in a suspended state vertically, which gives light access, ventilation and reduces percentage of diseases. Also, a vertical dressing saves the area of ​​the greenhouse.

With the appearance of peduncles, the main stem is tied to the support of the greenhouse. The initial flower stalks break off, since they are mostly empty and inhibit the growth of the vegetable crop. The pinching of the lateral processes is done according to the scheme separate for each variety.

Harvesting

Harvesting vegetables is carried out regularly, otherwise they slow down the growth and emergence of new ones. Harvesting is carried out in the morning or in the evening, it should be started after watering: this way the vegetables are pricked much less.

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Anna Evans

Author ✓ Farmer

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