What is advised to do if cabbage seedlings are stretched

Often, the owners of their garden-garden are faced with problems when growing cabbage for seedlings. The culture is gentle and requires special conditions. With insufficient light, growing in too dense or infertile soil, at elevated temperatures, the seedlings stretch out, turn pale, and get sick.

It is possible to save young plants, but for this you need to take a number of measures in time. First of all, you need to find out the cause of the problem and fix it.

Why doesn't picking always help?

The reasons why cabbage forms a long, thin stem, and it eventually lays down, may be:

• lack of adequate nutrition due to sowing in infertile or too nitrogenous soil;
• lack of lighting - this is one of the most common reasons - after germination, it is advisable to extend the day so that the seedlings are in the light for about 14 hours a day;
• too high air temperature in the room where the seedlings are. Ideal for sprouts of cabbage is considered to be from +10 to + 11 ° C. The temperature should be gradually raised as it grows and brought to +17 after the appearance of the first true leaf;
• too frequent shoots: plants that have sprouted closely, interfering with each other, are forced to stretch in order to receive more sunlight.

Many summer residents are trying to help seedlings by picking up very young plants in separate pots. In this case, the stem is significantly deepened into the ground, and the plant takes on a length that pleases the owner's eye. However, picking does not solve the problem of insufficient illumination, abundance of heat, or improper soil composition. Therefore, the plants stretch out or die again.

What to do to solve the "cabbage problem"?

Even before the pick, which will take place after the appearance of the first true leaf, measures should be taken to stop further growth of seedlings:

1. Treat the ground part of the plant with a drug that slows down growth (for example, "Athlete", "Stoprost"). You can get one at any gardening store. After applying the "medicine", the stems become thicker, growth in height slows down, and the intensive appearance of new roots begins.
2. Pour rotten sawdust or crushed peat into a container with seedlings to support thin stems (preventing plants from lodging before diving).
3. The land must be fertilized with mineral fertilizers (potash and phosphorus). Store chemistry will replace your own ashes if you use the right wood, preferably young broadleaf trees.
4. Adjust the temperature so that the plants are cool (from +10 to + 13 ° C) and at the same time receive lighting for at least 14 hours. The seedlings are illuminated with special LED and LED phytolamps, as well as with ordinary incandescent lamps.

Dive or throw?

Many amateur gardeners advise getting rid of weak seedlings and sowing a new batch. Cabbage does not grow too quickly (up to 50 days), so there is a high risk of being late with a new sowing. In this case, you will have to choose not from the late varieties, but to plant the middle and early ones, given that not all of them are salted. In addition, if you do not eliminate the reasons why the first batch of cabbage stretched out, its fate will surely be repeated by the "next generation".

It is necessary to get rid of the elongated seedlings only if it gets sick. If the sprouts, albeit long, healthy, should be taken out into the cold (not lower than + 5 ° C!), Treated with drugs that slow down growth, and transplanted.

There are two ways to make a pick: by pinching the central spine or leaving it. In the first case, the plant slows down the growth of the ground part and forms a widely branched root system. In the second case, the long main root will help the cabbage during the dry season, drawing moisture from the lower layers of the soil.

Seedlings of cabbage, which are significantly extended by the time of planting in individual pots, must be deepened to the cotyledon leaves. 7-10 days after the procedure, the plants should be fed with mineral fertilizers.