Red beets are a frequent guest on our table. It is an ingredient in many dishes, tasty and healthy. There is a relative of her, who is distinguished by excellent taste, but is not yet so popular - this is chard, or leaf beets.
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Mangold - what is it, description
Chard is a subspecies of ordinary beets. Oddly enough, it began to be consumed much earlier than the usual burgundy root crop. Not only that, chard gave birth to the cultivars of this plant, which were the result of the hybridization of leaf and wild root beets.
This is a two-year-old plant with well-developed leaves and petioles, with a long and stiff rod root. If beetroot is the most valuable thing - it is a root crop, then at chard, everything useful is concentrated in the leaves. He resembles spinach in him, but the petioles can be not only green, but also yellow, red, pink or orange. Leaves are smooth or slightly bubbly, as if curly.
This culture is early ripe, some leafy varieties can give edible greens already 40 days after germination. Vegetable is usually used as a salad, but it is quite suitable for borscht or cabbage rolls.
The chard has two forms:
- stem - it is used together with stems;
- leaf - in these plants usually only leaves are cut.
The leaf form ripens 20 days earlier.
Varieties and varieties of chard
For cultivation, zoned varieties are most suitable.
- Scarlet. This is a very early variety. The first leaves and petioles can be obtained after 38 days. The leaf rosette is large, up to 60 cm high. Large green leaves have a purple hue.Red plants with a raspberry hue petioles up to 27 cm long are decorated.
- Charley. Start collecting leaves after 45 days. They are medium in size, have a red-green color, slightly bubbled. Petiole of medium length, not wide, reddish color.
- Mirage. The variety is mid-season, ready for harvest in 55 days. The leaves are located semi-vertically, their length together with the petiole is 50 cm. Strongly bubbly leaves have a light green color, and a long petiole is green.
- Ruby. Late-ripening variety. Ready to eat after 86 days from germination. The height of the outlet is 45 cm, most of it falls on the petiole - 34 cm. It is bright red, and the leaf is dark green with purple veins.
- Belavinka. Petiole variety, which ripens in 82 days. Reaching 70 cm in height, the rosette is formed by large dark green leaves located on long white petioles. The variety is not prone to flowering and tolerates low temperatures well.
The nuances of growing beetroot chard
Planting and caring for chard in open ground are not labor intensive. This leafy crop is surprisingly unpretentious and more cold-resistant than ordinary beets.
To sow it, you do not need to wait until the soil warms up well. Chard shoots appear when the air temperature reaches only 6 degrees of heat, but they grow and develop best at a temperature of about 20 degrees. Even young plants can tolerate a drop in temperature to -1 degree, and adults - up to -5. More frost-resistant sheet varieties.
Regular watering is very important for chard. With a lack of moisture, the leaves become smaller and coarser.
Outdoor landing
Since chard is sown very early, it is better to prepare a garden for it in the fall.
- Delicate leaves are obtained if the plants are grown on well-loosened, light in mechanical composition and well-provided with nutrients soil. Her reaction should be neutral.
- A place for a chard is better to choose a well-lit. With some shading, it also grows well, but it accumulates nitrates.
- Leafy beets are best sown after those crops, under which a lot of organic matter was introduced. If there is no such bed, then when preparing the soil for each square meter, they bring humus or well-ripened garden compost to the bucket.
- In the spring, the bed is loosened, adding a tablespoon of urea and a glass of ash per square meter.
With an excess of nitrogen, nitrates accumulate in the leaves of the chard.
Chard can be sown in three terms:
- at the end of April, at the same time as ordinary beets;
- in the middle of summer, then tasty greens can be consumed all fall;
- in the winter, at the same time as other crops suitable for winter sowing.
The seeds of chard are very similar to those of beets and consist of several seeds, seedlings always need thinning. In order for the seeds to come together amicably and quickly, they are soaked for a day in ordinary water. You can add a growth stimulator to it, applying it according to the instructions.
The seeds are sown to a depth of 2.5 cm. Petiole varieties need a large feeding area, so the row spacing is 40 cm for them. For leaf varieties, 25 cm is enough. Their seeds are laid out at a distance of 10 cm from each other. less often.
To get greens earlier, chard can be sown for seedlings. Do it already at the end of March. Growing plants at the age of about 35 days are planted on a bed in mid-May. By the way, this culture grows well even on the windowsill or on the balcony.
What plants can I plant with
Mangold, like beets, grows well with different onions and any kind of cabbage. He is also a good companion for salad. If you plant leaf beets next to garlic, and use mint leaves for mulching, then its growth will improve, and there will be no pests.
Do not plant chard next to representatives of the pumpkin family, green beans, mustard and corn.
Chard leaf rosettes are so decorative that they are appropriate not only in the garden, but also in the flowerbed, they shade beautifully flowering plants with their bright foliage. It is in this quality that chard is increasingly used by landscape designers
Leaf Beet Care
Growing chard leaf beet is quite affordable even for inexperienced gardeners, since this plant is undemanding.
To make the leaves more and more tender, it is enough to carry out the following care operations:
- as soon as the seedlings appeared, they need to be spudded - the plant will be more stable;
- double thinning will be required - at the stage of 2 - 3 true leaves and after another 2 weeks, keeping the distance between the plants of petiole varieties at 40 cm, and between leaf rosettes at 25;
- chard should be regularly watered;
- fertilizing with nitrogen fertilizers will be needed only in the first phase of growth, subsequently fed with a weak solution of complex mineral fertilizers.
Cut the leaves so as not to damage the growth point, leaving a part of the petiole about 2 cm long.
Chard propagation
If you cover the chard bushes for the winter with earth, and then with a layer of compost and leaves, they are quite capable of transferring the frosty winter. In spring, the leaves will grow, and soon a flower arrow will appear, which will form seeds after flowering. They can be used for further sowing, since chard propagates only by seed.
Diseases and pests of leaf beets
Most often, beet chard is affected by fungal diseases: a black leg and powdery mildew. For their prevention, you need not to overdo it with watering and do not forget about the introduction of potash fertilizers, which stimulate the immunity of plants. A good prophylactic is colloidal sulfur. Its powder is dusted with leaves three times during the season.
They protect themselves from beetroot fleas using special insecticides, and they fight aphids with the help of infusions of insecticidal herbs, onions and garlic. They are used in the form of sprayings.
