Finnish Straw Beds
People have long known about the cultivation of cucurbits and solanaceous crops on straw. In Finnish and Karelian villages straw beds found widespread use not only among fans, but also in large farms.
How to Make Finnish Straw Beds
Advantages of straw briquettes over ground are quite substantial: material savings, compactness, environmental cleanliness, early yield, convenience and easy-to-use agricultural machinery. Straw bed does not require digging, hoeing, mulching, weeding and lime, and it is processed in the needed compost after its use.
Straw beds for cultivation of cucumbers, stunted tomatoes or sweet pepper can be done on any soil structure and even infected with pathogenic fungi. Hay bacillus formed in a straw substrate is harmless to crops, which resists Phytophthora pathogens and parasitic microorganisms. Therefore, hay and straw are recommended for mulching and covering the useful plants for the winter.
Preparing beds for fall
Dig a trench and cover it with polyethylene, which is removed with the spring snowmelt and substituted by a nonwoven fabric of medium density, laying it on the entire area of the patch. Tightly linked bundles or briquettes of straw are laid on the top of the cover.
The second stage
Activation of biodegradation synthesis is a chief stage of beds preparation. Prepared straw is moistened with hot water and well compacted. Then shower it with liquid humic fertilizer and cover it with polyethylene. For one week the temperature should rise to 113 ° F. After the second week of “synthesis” remove the cover and make penetration in the straw for seedlings.
Seedlings are planted in the pits, sprinkled with wet peat and watered with heated water. Then put the arc and close with tightly nonwoven fabric. The outer layer of the material has to allow moisture partially. Plants on straw are grown like in greenhouse: plants are watered timely in a well ventilated space.