PREPARATION OF THE SOIL

PREPARATION OF THE SOIL

Before planting fruit trees and shrubs, you need to carefully prepare the sites, in which they will grow. They are long-lived plants and what conditions we will create for them now, we will have such effects for many years. Therefore, the first step will be to dig the soil deeply. It is also desirable, especially on sandy soils, fertilization of the plot or garden with manure (in the amount of approx 500 kg in 100 m2) or compost – at twice the dose. If we have difficulties acquiring manure or compost, we use the cultivation of mixtures to obtain green fertilizer. They can be mixtures of different crops. It is used on light soils: yellow lupine, a little dot, mustard, oat; blue lupine can also be grown on the more fertile, vetch, seradelę, spring rape and phacelia. Examples of such mixtures (according to prof. WITH. Juice) are given in the table.

Table. Examples of cover mixtures for green manure (sowing standards in dag na 100 m2)

Legumes have this advantage, that they fix atmospheric nitrogen and thus enrich the soil with this component. Their disadvantage is the slow germination of seeds, as a result, they do not emerge quite poorly in dry summers.

When preparing the soil for fruit trees or shrubs, additionally phosphorus and potassium fertilizers can be used. The decision to use these fertilizers depends on the fertility of the soil, about which we are informed by the chemical analysis of the soil, about which in an earlier chapter.

If we use the cultivation of cover crops, then we give mineral fertilizers before sowing the mixture, In addition, nitrogen fertilizers should also be applied before sowing the mixture, in an amount 3 kg of ammonium nitrate or 4 kg of calcium ammonium nitrate per 100 m2.

In places, where we want to plant trees, we dig the holes. For two-year-old trees, holes with a diameter are prepared 50-60 cm, it is enough for one-year-old maiden trees 40 cm in diameter; the depth of the dimples – 35-40 cm. Digging a dimple, the top one comes off first, humus layer of soil on the pile. Then the soil extracted from the bottom is collected separately, which is either spread over the inter-rows, or - after sprinkling the previously collected humus layer on the roots - filling the top of the backfilled well with it. When backfilling the roots, it is better to fill the hole with soil taken from the inter-rows. If it is not possible to fertilize the entire surface with organic fertilization, and the soil is too barren, larger wells should be prepared – in diameter 100 cm and depth to 50 cm. Such wells are filled only with the top, with a humus layer of soil, and at their bottom several buckets of compost or rotten manure are placed. However, it is not allowed to give fresh manure, as it may do more harm than good!