A re you a commercial farmer, a gardener or even a newbies interested in vegetable cultivation business? Then you must have your chemic...
Are you a commercial farmer, a
gardener or even a newbies interested in vegetable cultivation business? Then
you must have your chemical/fertilizer application hand book at the onset of
the season. If you don’t, then you aren’t
really prepared for business. Waiting for challenges before acting might not be
funny as vegetables are highly susceptible to diseases and pest.
Due to the nature of my work,
I have seen and interacted with both local and educated farmers and I see many
aren’t prepared and are often blind to what and what to use at commencement of
cultivation, they only think of this when there is/are challenge(s). Therefore,
through my years of valuable experiences in vegetable cultivation, I have
developed this simple protocol for wet season vegetable production. Please, do
note
that in using this for dry season cultivation, there would be little
adjustment.
1. Pesticide Application:
The first thing that would
come to a newbies’ mind when he/she heard the word pest is insect. Well, if you
think so, you aren’t far from the answer. A pest ranges from insect, to other destructive
arthropods (Insect family) like spider mite, aphids, caterpillars etc, birds,
rodents, wild animals and even weeds. Yes, I mean weeds.
Weeds control: Before you
transplant your veggies from your nursery and even for those that require
direct planting, you must prepare your field by getting rid of the weeds. In
this case, you would need to spray an herbicide if you aren’t going to do
manual weeding. So, you could decide to spray contact herbicide (e.g active ingredient-
Paraquat), or systemic herbicide (e.g active ingredient –Glyphosate). Both are
post emergence herbicide. You could as well decide to use pre-emergence
herbicide but that must be after the beds have been made. In order word, let it
be the last thing you would do before transplanting/direct planting proper.
Remember that it is important you pay attention to the instruction written on
the label of the herbicide particularly the pre-emergence herbicide as they are
crop specific. Don’t use wrong pre-emergence herbicide for your veggies of
choice otherwise; you end up killing or affecting their germination/growth
adversely. Also, pay attention to the number of days you are expected to allow
before transplanting/direct planting after you must have used pre-emergence
herbicide.
After your crops are on the
field, you could decide to use herbicide to weed the field particularly the
walk-through. In this case, you use ONLY contact herbicide gently very early in
the morning without allowing it to touch your crop. This can be repeated every
2 weeks depending on the level of growth rate of your weeds. Please, do get rid
of weeds few days at worse after their germination, not doing so will affect
the yield of your crops among other things.
Insect/Arthropod control: Depending on your vegetable crop type, you
would need insecticide/acaricide to take care of insect attack. In case of tomato
for example, you hardly have insect issues during the wet season except on two occasions:
when they are still seedlings and when they are fruiting (fruit worm problems).
For other veggies like cucumbers, melon and watermelons, you could also
experience fruit worm problem during fruiting stage and defoliation during
seedling period. On the other hand some veggies do have serious defoliation
problem; Okra being at the top of the list and host of other leafy veggies like
cabbage, lettuce etc.
For those that are prone to
insect attack as explained above, please apply (spray) both narrow and broad
spectrum family insecticide whether of contact or systemic insecticide properties
every 1 week and 2-3 weeks respectively. For the one without serious insect
issues as explained above, wait till you see a sign of attack before use but
notwithstanding, have your insecticide handy.
Please click Understanding the Use of Pesticide to know more about pesticide and usage.
2. Fungicide/Nematicide Application:
If there is any challenge you
must experience during the wet season on your veggies farm, it is fungi
infection. This is because; fungi often thrive during period with high humidity
when the leave surfaces would be persistently wet. Therefore, do not wait for
signs of infection before application. You can use both contact and systemic
fungicide interchangeably every 2 weeks. However, you should try to reapply
after each heavy rainfall even if it is not up to 1 week the last time you
applied as heavy rainfall often washes or dilute the fungicide presence on/within
the vegetable leaves.
Also note that it is good you
interchange fungicide used one after the other as this would give you a better
protection against diseases. There are fungicide with the following active ingredients;
Carbendazim (contact), Macozeb (systemic), Metalaxy (systemic), Copper based (both)
etc.
As for nematodes, you can
apply nematicide mixed with your soil fertilizer.
You may also read: A to Z on tomato nursery preparation
You may also read: A to Z on tomato nursery preparation
3. Fertilizer Application:
If you really want the best
out of your veggies and you aren’t practicing organic farming, then you must
you inorganic fertilizer in addition to manure. At transplanting/direct
planting stage, use NPK as basal application (10g/stand). After 2-3 weeks of
transplanting/direct planting, use NPK as side dressing for fruit veggies or
only ammonium base fertilizer like urea for leafy veggies.
At the onset of flowering, you
can use SSP (single super phosphate) mixed with Potassium Nitrate for fruit
veggies as side dressing and Urea for leafy veggies. After every major harvest,
you could use SSP plus Potassium Nitrate as side dressing.
To have the best of performance,
please spray folia fertilizer every 2-3 weeks from transplanting to harvesting.
Remember, leafy veggies only require ammonium based fertilizer like urea except
the first application during transplanting.
I hope you have gained from
this article, do encourage us to leave comment behind as the case may be.
Should you have any question or comment, do drop such below to receive response
from experts around the globe.
Please Note: A detailed Fertilizer/Agrochemical
e-workbook is available but at a token fee. Please contact us for request and read more on it by clicking Vegetable Ebooks or watch Video on Commercial Tomato Production
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