Peking cabbage is an unpretentious vegetable crop that can yield two harvests during the entire warm season. Even an inexperienced summer resident can grow it. This plant is easy to care for. Peking cabbage is absolutely not capricious, grows quickly, is well stored, is very useful and has excellent taste.
But there are negative aspects in its cultivation. In the first place, of course, pests - slugs and a cruciferous flea. Getting rid of them is not easy. They are able to spoil a large amount of the crop. And the second problem is shooting. Sometimes cabbage cannot form a full-fledged head of cabbage.
To overcome these problems, it is necessary to familiarize yourself in more detail with the peculiarities of growing this vegetable crop.
Planting dates for Chinese cabbage: how to avoid shooting
To prevent Chinese cabbage from going into the arrows, it is necessary to plant it at a certain time. Favorable conditions for flowering and seed formation are a large amount of light during long daylight hours. So the best time to plant cabbage is early spring (about mid-April) or mid-summer. At this time, the daylight hours are a little shorter and there is no need to be afraid of flowers.
Experienced breeders also went to meet the gardeners in solving this problem and bred Dutch hybrid varieties that are not threatened by shooting.
Peking cabbage is one of the early ripening vegetables, but it also has early, medium and late varieties. Depending on the variety, it ripens from forty to eighty days.
Growing Chinese cabbage: basic agricultural technology
You can grow this type of cabbage using seeds or seedlings. The seed method is used less often, and the seedling method is considered more reliable.
Growing Chinese cabbage through seedlings
Peking cabbage seeds can be planted twice a year - at the end of March (for seedlings) and at the end of June (for use in winter). This culture does not react well to picking and it is difficult to take root in a new place. That is why seeds are recommended to be grown in individual containers.
Small pots are filled with a special loose potting soil mixture. It can consist of peat and turf (in equal amounts) or coconut base and humus (in a two to one ratio). Each seed is planted to a depth of about one centimeter and the containers are left in a warm room. Very soon (after 2-3 days) young shoots will appear.
After their appearance, the plants will need good lighting and moderate watering. In about a month, the seedlings will have 5 full-fledged leaves. This means that it is time to transplant cabbage to the beds. The site should be not shaded, well lit.
Vegetable predecessors must be considered. It is good if onions, garlic, carrots or potatoes were grown on this site before cabbage.
Growing Chinese cabbage without seedlings
The seeds are planted in separate holes to a depth of one and a half to two centimeters, after adding five hundred milliliters of humus and two tablespoons of wood ash to them. Pour them with a little water. The distance between the beds and holes is approximately the same (about 30 centimeters). From above, the holes are crushed with ash and covered with a transparent film. The first shoots will appear in about a week.
Leaving, watering, feeding Chinese cabbage
Peking cabbage prefers to grow in a well-lit area with high humidity and cool temperatures. The most favorable temperature regime for this culture is 15-20 degrees Celsius. If the air temperature becomes less than thirteen or more than twenty-five, then you can not even dream of a bountiful harvest.
Experienced gardeners recommend using non-woven cloth to cover plants when growing Chinese cabbage. Such a "blanket" will protect still not matured plants from unexpected frosts and sudden temperature changes. The cold can kill young Chinese cabbage seedlings.
In hot and dry weather, a linen cover will create a shady area for a vegetable crop and protect it from overheating.
If summer comes out with abundant and prolonged rains, then a linen shelter will save the cabbage from decay. Excess moisture cannot do any good for the cabbage.
And another positive quality of such a cover is protection from pests. Cruciferous flea beetles will not immediately detect their favorite treat.
To protect the plant from weeds, it is necessary to use soil mulching. Mulch can be spread on cabbage beds about half a month after planting seedlings in open ground. Such a layer of organic matter helps to maintain soil moisture for a long time and prevents weeds from growing.
Watering is plentiful, only warm water is used. One abundant watering every 7 days is enough.
The amount of dressings depends on the timing of planting the cabbage. "Spring" culture is fed three times, and "summer" - twice. Fertilizers are applied by watering and spraying. Various infusions are used for nutritious irrigation:
- Add 1 liter of mullein to 10 liters of water
- For 20 liters of water - 1 liter of bird droppings
- For 9 liters of water - 1 kilogram of fresh grass
Each sapling of Peking cabbage needs one liter of infusion.
Spraying with a solution of water and boric acid promotes better formation of the ovary. It is necessary to dissolve two grams of boric acid in one liter of boiling water, and then add cold water (9 liters).
How to get rid of cruciferous fleas and slugs on Chinese cabbage
The positive quality of Peking cabbage is that it can only in very rare cases become infected with some kind of disease. This vegetable crop grows very quickly and simply does not have time to get sick.
But the negative side is that there are two permanent pests who love to feast on this type of cabbage. It is very difficult to fight the cruciferous flea and slugs, and it is rarely possible to win. There is only one way out - preventive measures that will scare away pests and prevent them from reaching the beds:
Landing time. You need to plant cabbage at a time when the cruciferous flea is still or no longer - this is April or July.
Using covers. For example, a nonwoven fabric will be a good pest control.
Wood ash. After planting the seeds, it is necessary to tame the beds with ash - this will scare off the cruciferous flea.
Compliance with crop rotation. Seedlings and seeds of this culture must be planted only in those beds where other cruciferous plants did not grow. Pest larvae are not afraid of harsh winters, they remain in the soil until the new season. Therefore, plant cabbage after root crops, onions, garlic, potatoes.
Joint landings. Try to confuse the cruciferous flea - plant the cabbage along with other vegetables.It will grow beautifully next to cucumbers and tomatoes, with onions and garlic. The pest will be confused.
If preventive measures were not carried out, and the flea nevertheless appeared on the site, then various insecticidal or biological products will come to the rescue (these are Fitoverm, Bitoxibacillin, Aktellika and others). You can use the drugs about 30 days before picking cabbage.
The second annoying pest is the slug. It is almost impossible to get rid of it, you need to show great efforts to combat it. The experience of gardeners and folk methods helps here:
- Processing Chinese cabbage with a special dry composition of wood ash (500 milliliters), table salt (2 tablespoons), mustard powder (1 tablespoon) and chili powder (2 tablespoons).
- Using burdock leaves or boards to lure slugs under them, after which the pests are destroyed.
- Watering the beds with a solution of water with brilliant green (for 10 liters of water - one bottle).
Storing Chinese cabbage
Peking cabbage is a frost-resistant plant that continues to grow even with the onset of light frosts (up to about minus four). Therefore, harvesting can be done even in mid-October.
You can determine the maturity of cabbage by the state of the head, it must be very dense. You can safely cut such cabbage. It is only necessary to take into account that spring planting cabbage is not intended for long-term autumn-winter storage. It is best consumed in the summer. But vegetables of summer planting are stored for a very long time, sometimes until spring.
The storage temperature for Chinese cabbage should be low (about 5 degrees Celsius). In order for the vegetable to retain moisture and juiciness, each of its heads is wrapped in a transparent film for food.
