Growing chickpeas yourself: instructions

Although chickpeas need a lot of sun and warmth, you can also grow them yourself in this country, provided that they can offer the plants a full sun. Because this is essential for successfully growing annual legumes, which can be harvested about eight to twelve weeks after sowing.

Grow chickpeas

At the beginning of the cultivation there is the question of the seeds. This is with chickpeas, bot. Cicer arietinum, very easy to get because you can use (organic) chickpeas from the supermarket to grow yourself. Make sure that these are dried, unpeeled and unroasted "peas".

Location and soil

Before you start sowing or When starting to plant out preferred plants, you should choose the right location in the garden, because the legumes do not like to move at all. Since Cicer arietinum not only loves warmth, but also needs it for its development, the temperature at the location should be between 20 ° C and 28 ° C during the day and above 18 ° C at night. You can only achieve these requirements in this country on one

sunny location. This means a place that offers blazing sun for at least six hours a day. A partially shaded location is also possible, but not recommended. In addition to the correct location, attention must also be paid to the soil, because chickpeas are picky about soil quality. So you have no chance of a high-yield harvest with loamy, heavy ones, because the legumes need a soil

• sandy
• easy to moderate
• lime rich
• low in nutrients
• evenly moist
• permeable

is. Also, they should have the Crop rotation Note, because Cicer arietinum are incompatible with themselves. Therefore, they can only be grown again at the same location after four to five years.

Sowing or growing

When growing chickpeas yourself, you have the choice between two variants, direct sowing or growing inside.

sowing

Cicer arietinum is easy to care for, but it needs a lot of warmth. Therefore it is only allowed to sow if no night frosts are to be expected, and the temperature does not fall below five degrees Celsius even at night. In this country, these conditions are usually only given from mid-May, i.e. after the ice saints. When sowing, follow the instructions below:

• Thoroughly loosen the soil with a rake or cultivator
• Draw the seed furrow
• Sowing depth: three to eight centimeters
• Distance between rows: 30 centimeters
• Distance within the row: 20 centimeters
• Cover the chickpeas with soil
• pour on

Cultivation

The second variant of growing chickpeas yourself is cultivation. With this method, young plants or Seedlings preferred inside, which will then move to the garden from mid-May. As the plants, as already mentioned, do not like to move, compostable pots or pots should be used for cultivation. Containers are used, because these have the advantage that the plants can be planted out in the garden together with the pots. But before that happens, young plants or peas have to be made from the peas. Become seedlings. To achieve this goal, follow the instructions below:

• Fill compostable pots with potting soil
• Depending on the size, add one to two chickpeas to each pot
• Sowing depth: two to three centimeters
• cover with earth
• carefully pour on

Put the pots on a light and sunny windowsill. The room temperature should be between 20 ° C and 22 ° C. During maintenance, you should make sure that the substrate on the surface is always slightly damp for the next two weeks. However, it must not be completely soaked. You should be able to see the first seedlings after about 14 days.

time

Peas that have been brought forward are only allowed in the garden bed when there is no further threat of frost and the temperature no longer falls below ten degrees Celsius, even at night. This is the case in this country after the ice saints, from mid-May. Since pre-grown chickpea plants are only allowed to go outdoors when they are around ten centimeters tall, the following calculations are made:

• two weeks germination period
• two weeks of growth

This calculation sets the time for the start of cultivation in the second half of April.

Planting out

Once the young plants have reached the right height, the time has come for them to move. Since the weather in our latitudes is no longer as reliable as it used to be, you should take the young plants harden before planting out by putting them outside for a few hours on a warm day. So the chickpeas can slowly get used to the new conditions. For the actual planting out, proceed as follows:

• Plant young plants at a distance of 12 to 20 centimeters in the row of beds
• Distance between the rows: approx. 50 centimeters
• Planting depth: approx. 5 centimeters
• pour on

If you have put two chickpeas in the pot, only the stronger plant will go outside. Use sharp scissors to cut off the weaker plant at ground level. Under no circumstances should you tear them up, as you will damage the delicate root system of both young plants.

care

Once the chickpeas are planted in the garden, they don't need much care. When growing chickpeas, it is important that the soil never dries out completely. Plants like dryness better than wetness, which they cannot tolerate by the way, but complete dryness harms them. It is recommended to water the plants once or twice a week during flowering and pod formation during dry periods. When watering, be careful not to get the leaves wet. How to prevent diseases like powdery mildew. As soon as the pods are ripe and the plant begins to shrink, reduce the watering. In this case it should be sufficient if you water the legumes every week to two weeks.

tip: The plants are particularly sensitive to too much moisture shortly before harvest. For example, the pods can start to go moldy.

The plants do not need additional fertilizers. A nitrogen-rich fertilizer is even counterproductive because, while it promotes the growth of Cicer arietinum, it reduces the crop yield.