Green fertilizers are planted with the aim to give the soil composition looseness, improve it and enrich it with organic matter. Quite often in the role of siderata appears radish oilseed, corresponding to all the specified requirements. The most important value of this plant is that it has the ability to grow greens, even in cold weather.
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Description and characteristics of oil radish
The plant is one-year, capable of reaching a two-meter mark in growth. Stem branched, abundantly covered with leaves of bright green hue. In just a month and a half, the root system and the deciduous mass can increase to five to ten kilograms per square meter of cultivated area.
The culture responds well to late sowing, is able to take root deeply and grow quickly. For this reason, its crops close for a short period of time, drowning out the weed vegetation that appears. Radish is not able to resist even the main weed - wheat grass.
Unpretentious oil plant is able to adapt without any problems to any weather conditions and soil compositions. Well developed roots can extract moisture from deep soil layers. The culture is considered cold and drought-resistant, perfectly tolerates shade, loves the abundance of water.
It should be added that the vegetable:
- quickly gaining growth;
- perfectly binds nitrogen;
- has a phytosanitary effect, suppressing nematodes and a number of pathogens of certain diseases;
- considered one of the best sideratov, improves soil quality.
Due to the fact that the roots of plants are powerful, it is advised to plant on clay soils in order to improve their structure.
Use as a siderata
This culture is best cultivated in loamy areas, peatlands, weak acid beds, vineyards that will contribute to the destruction of harmful pathogens in the ground, wireworm, fungus for a period of three to six years. The soil composition will become loose, enriched, drained. On such a land, other cultures will grow somewhat faster.
Soil protection and enrichment
Use as a sideratnogo plant allows you to enrich the beds with the missing nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus, calcium. Among the advantages should also include its ability to protect the soil from water and wind erosion, which are most pronounced in spring and autumn;
Phytosanitary quality
The plant contains essential oils that help protect the plant itself and the ground from the fungus and the attacks of harmful parasites. Often, radish has a preventive effect of wireworm, potato scab. Thick greens perfectly shade the ground, not allowing the weeds to grow. Rotten foliage is considered an excellent place for the reproduction of microorganisms that are beneficial to the soil.
Use as a feed crop
Together with rabs, oilseed radish is sown for use as feed for livestock. This application of vegetable culture has become possible due to its excellent yields and operational ripening. From each hectare, you can easily get from three hundred to four hundred centners of forage. And if the soil is systematically fertilized, then this figure will rise to seven hundred centners.
From sowing the culture to its full formation takes less than one and a half months. It turns out that during one season there is an opportunity to mow the tops three times.
Greens can be given to animals fresh, used as raw material in the preparation of silage, haylage, herbal flour, briquette.
When ensiling, the vegetable is mixed with other herbs, pea and oat crops are added. Having formed the fourth leaf, the plant is completely ready to become successful accompaniment of corn.
For the purpose of weeding this crop, pasture can be used to walk livestock even in the autumn period.
The energy indices of a nutrient plant resemble feed, clover and alfalfa. Only protein vegetable contains about twenty-six percent, and this protein is the optimal number of amino acids.Radish contains:
- zinc;
- potassium;
- iron.
During the flowering period in one kilogram of green there is 30 ml of carotene and 600 ml of vitamin C.
Use as a honey plant
Oilseed vegetable is an excellent honey plant. It blooms for a long time, it can produce nectar even in cold weather. Honey is collected in the spring and in the middle of the summer season, when other honey plants no longer bloom. Nectar contains about twenty percent of sucrose, glucose and fructose.
But it should be noted that the honey from this plant is very thick and it is not recommended to keep it for a long period.
When and how to sow oilseed radish?
Sowing culture can be performed at any time, based on your goals. As a rule, the sowing period begins in April and ends by mid-September. Radish as feed or green manure must be sown, maintaining an interval between rows of fifteen centimeters. As a rule, there are two to three grams of seed material per unit area, which should be buried into three to four centimeters.
If the sowing is late, then sow will have to be denser. With the onset of mid-August, the sowing norms doubled as the radish grows slightly slower in cool weather.
It is best to sow a vegetable with a forty-centimeter interval between rows for seeds or honey.
As you can see, Pancake week is considered an industrial and strategic plant. Its popularity is increasing every day. With minimal care for this plant, you can solve several problematic issues in your backyard plot.