Celery is a healthy plant, and depending on the species, its root, leaves or petioles are eaten. The universally known product is used for medicinal purposes and for dietary nutrition. Leaving is not difficult even for beginner gardeners, so the culture is extremely popular among summer residents of central Russia.
Types of celery and their cultivation
Perennial herbaceous plant of the Umbrella family has a bright pleasant aroma and unusual taste. His homeland is located in the Mediterranean, but today celery is grown everywhere.
There are three types:
- Stem or petiole is distinguished by the duration of storage and useful properties. It is characterized by juicy shoots of light salad, green color, which differ due to the method of cultivation, species has nothing to do with it. Sometimes you can even get white stems with good hilling plants, if you constantly sprinkle them with earth.
- Celery leaf is widely used in cooking. It grows all summer and autumn, has a pleasant taste and a bright aroma. It is difficult to imagine conservation without its greenery.
- Root is eaten raw and stewed. It is used instead of potatoes in the preparation of dietary first courses. In salads, combined with apple, carrots.
Depending on taste preferences, you can plant one type of plant or several.
Celery planting dates
Celery can be planted in spring and autumn, depending on the method. Seedlings are transferred to the soil when it reaches a height of 15 cm and has 4-5 leaves. Seeds are prepared from the fall. Planted material in the winter, so that in the season it was easier to care for plants. Experienced gardeners still prefer to germinate seeds at home, so higher yields. Root crops are grown only through seedlings.
The month of planting in the soil directly depends on the region. The closer to Siberia, the later the plants are transplanted. For example, in the Urals - in May, early June; in the suburbs - April, May.
The main requirement for weather conditions is a constant temperature of +10 ° C, the absence of frosts.
According to the lunar calendar, celery is planted: root seedlings - April 26-30, May 1-4; seeds and seedlings of leaf and petiole - May 8-10, May 14-17.
Location
Given that the homeland of celery in the south, understand that he needs a lot of sun. Accordingly, choosing a site for planting, give preference to warm, brightly lit places, away from trees and buildings.
The beds are prepared in the fall. The land is dug up and cleared of weeds and plant debris. Pour peat or humus and leave until spring.
Aromatic grass is a protection against many types of pests, so it is recommended to plant it next to cabbage, tomatoes, cucumbers, beans, leaf lettuce. Such a neighborhood will help to increase and maintain the harvest, and celery does not hurt at all. With potatoes, parsley and carrots, on the contrary, it is not recommended to combine it in the beds.
Seedling method of growing
For seedlings, you must select the seeds. The culture is not highly germinated, as it contains a large number of vegetable oils that prevent swelling. Planting material is bought in abundance, it is worth paying attention to the shelf life of the product, since 2 years after assembly, germination is still reduced.
Before planting, the seeds are prepared, washed in a weak solution of potassium permanganate (slightly pinkish tint of liquid). After two hours of soaking, the material is spread on a damp cloth or napkin, wrapped and transferred to a dry, warm place. To increase germination, growth stimulants or aloe juice are added to the water, a few drops. Experienced gardeners create extreme conditions by immersing a bag of seeds in hot or cold water.
Soil for sowing is prepared independently or purchased in a store. For independent mixing you will need sand, peat, humus and universal land in equal proportions. Having mixed the substrate, it is steamed, heated in the oven or frozen for disinfection. The soil surface is moistened by spraying with a spray gun.
Evenly spread the seed over the surface, lightly sprinkling it with peat or sand. After wetting the crops again, cover them with glass or film to create a greenhouse effect. During cultivation, ensure that the surface of the earth is moist.
For 2 weeks, and sometimes more, boxes with future seedlings are kept in the dark and warm. The temperature should be + 18 ... +20 ° С. When the first shoots appear, the containers are transferred to a bright place, the coating is removed and the temperature is lowered by several degrees. At night, you can lower it to + 10 ... +12 ° C. For the root variety, the temperature regime is important, if you do not observe it, celery will bloom, and this can not be allowed. The daylight hours are at least 10 hours, so if necessary, you will need to connect artificial lighting.
When young plants form two full leaves on a thin tender stem, you can dive seedlings. To do this, take the same land, adding a little wood ash to it, and lay out in separate containers. Transferred into the container along the sprout, pinching the main root for its development (only for petiole and leaf).
Watering seedlings is needed in moderation. The soil after irrigation is loosened so that a crust does not form. 2 weeks after transplanting, celery is fed with special preparations for the growth and development of food crops.
The first one and a half months, plant growth is slowed down, with a lack of light, the shoots stretch upward, which is unacceptable. Stems 25 cm high and having 4-5 full leaves are completely ready for planting into the ground. If sowing was done in a timely manner, then by mid-May the seedlings are ready. Before planting in the ground, celery is hardened, briefly taking the container to the street and gradually increasing the time spent outdoors.
Planting seedlings in open ground
Planting seedlings does not occur immediately. For some time it is kept in a shaded place on the street. Only when 6 leaves appear can celery be transferred to the ground.
If a preliminary pick has not been carried out, it is done immediately before landing. This is done as follows: well soaked with an earthen lump of water, seedlings are pulled out, carefully separating the roots.
A plot prepared in the fall for a garden bed is carefully loosened and seedlings are planted, depending on the species, as follows:
- Root - at a distance of 15 cm from each other, observing the row spacing of 0.4 meters.
- Petiole - planted to a depth of 6 cm, in a row leaving 20 cm on each side, between rows of 0.3 m.
- Leaf - 10 cm deep, it is not necessary to observe the distance between plants.
Having deepened the seedling, the planting site is pressed and abundantly watered.
Direct sowing in open ground
In the absence of seedlings or unwillingness tinkering with young plants carry out sowing in open ground. In time, this happens in late autumn, before the first frost.
If the bed is not fertilized, prepare it: dig it up, clean it of debris and weeds, introduce fertilizers. It is not necessary to prepare seeds as seedlings, but it is important to choose fresh seed, preferably this year. After deepening the seeds by 2 cm, cover the area with a film. When choosing a place, they comply with the requirements necessary for the plant: good light and soil moisture.
It is necessary to sow densely in the winter, many seeds will not sprout, and it is easy to thin out excess in the spring.
The advantages of this planting include the fact that in early spring fresh greens will appear. Otherwise, the risks are too great. Experienced summer residents are advised to play it safe and still grow seedlings.
If we talk about species, then the most resistant to frost leaf celery. It often emerges after prolonged winters.
Outdoor Celery Care
Each variety of plants needs a kind of care:
- Root - afraid of weeds that grow quickly and interfere with seedlings. They recommend paying special attention to weeding. You need to feed the plant three times, the first time 2 weeks after planting. A little later, when the stems begin to actively rise, they will fertilize repeatedly. The last time - upon the formation of the root crop in the initial period.
- Petiole - must be planted correctly. On the beds prepared since autumn, they make indentations of 30 cm, leaving 0.4 meters between rows. Fill the wells with fertilizer. Ditches are designed to cover the petioles so that they are white and not bitter. There are specially bred varieties that do not need hilling, but they are not so tasty and are afraid of the cold. After planting seedlings, the first top dressing is carried out a month later. The stalks are covered with growth as they grow, carefully monitoring the moisture of the soil. After irrigation, the soil must be loosened. When the height of the bush reaches 30 cm, the shoots are neatly tied into bundles, wrapped with dark paper, leaving only the tops with leaves on the surface.
- Leaf - the most unpretentious species. He needs timely watering, weeding and loosening. To prevent crust formation after irrigation, dry grass is laid at the base, at a small distance from the center of the bush, so that growth does not stop.
Celery Diseases and Pests
The plant in the beds is not protected from diseases and pests, therefore, it is recommended to carefully monitor the crop, taking timely measures when problems are detected.
Problem | Signs and Causes | Remedial measures |
| Rust | Small spots of reddish-brown color, densely scattered on the surface of leaves and petioles. Gradually affected areas dry up. | As a treatment, spraying the site with Fitosporin-M at a concentration of 4-5 mg per liter of water is used. A lot of the drug will not be needed per 1 sq. Km. m. only 100 ml are required. solution. |
| Septoria | In cool, damp weather, yellow spots with whitish midpoints appear on plants in the last days of summer. On the stems are brown depressed lesions. | The treatments for Topsin-M and Fundazole are carried out. The drugs are toxic, so they are stopped 20 days before the harvest. |
| Cercosporosis | A sign of the disease is light spots with brown bordering on the surface of the leaf, in advanced cases the petioles are covered with a purple coating. | |
| Downy mildew | With strong temperature drops and cold dew in the morning, celery is covered with a white cobwebbed coating, as the condition worsens, a film with black patches appears. | It is treated by spraying with infusion of field sow thistle. The medicine is prepared as follows: 300 grams of the crushed culture is poured into half a bucket of water and allowed to stand for 8 hours. |
| Cucumber mosaic | The virus is carried by pests, aphids and ticks. Spots or rings of various sizes and shapes appear on the plant. | When signs are detected, the bushes are destroyed. The disease is not treatable. |
| Borsch fly | The most dangerous pest in May, flies to make a masonry under the skin of leaves. In this case, tubercles form. The larva eats long tunnels inside the shoot during maturation, making them bitter and fibrous. | The only means of protection against a fly is an onion planted in the aisle. As a preventive measure, it is recommended to carefully monitor the cleanliness of the beds. |
| Carrot fly | Lays offspring under the roots. Larvae eat greens and shoots, roots and leaves. | Affected bushes and neighboring crops treat the aisles with a mixture of sand, dry mustard and tobacco dust, combined in equal proportions. |
| Bean aphid | Dangerous for the crop, drinks juices from the leaves of plants, while it is a carrier of diseases. | Spray with a decoction of the tops of potatoes, tomatoes or dandelion. You can use an infusion of citrus peel water in a ratio of 10: 1. Keep in a dark place for 2-3 days, then spray the bushes affected by aphids. As a preventive measure, it is recommended to clean the site of weeds and plant debris in a timely manner. |
Mr. Dachnik advises: how to remove and preserve the celery crop
Each type of celery matures in due time and you need to harvest accordingly:
- Stem - harvested by the end of autumn, and selectively break off a couple of petioles during the summer.
- Root - you need to dig up root crops before frost. Growth continues until mid-autumn, so thinning and eating part of the crop is permissible. Dig plants carefully, without injuring neighboring plants.
- Leafy - greens break off, pruning does not affect plant health very well. Thin roots are harvested, and the main rhizome is dried and sent for storage.
