Growing Eggplant
Some Important Tips On Growing Eggplant
Before determining how to grow eggplant, you will want to decide which variety of eggplant is suitable for your region and for your soil values. Almost as important as these issues are your personal preferences when it comes to eggplant, and there are four distinct varieties that you can choose from. There are the smaller whites, the popular purple globes, the black beauty, and the Italian long eggplant types to choose from, and you may want to sample each one before learning how to grow eggplant that you and your family will love. You will want to begin by ensuring that your soil is sandy and is enriched with natural fertilizers and compounds. Organic deposits should be mixed in well, and the eventually planting plot should be in a full sun area.
Your first lesson in how to grow eggplant has to do with a thing called “hardening” your seedlings. This is accomplished by starting your seed indoors, at temperatures above 65 degrees Fahrenheit. This should be done in 2 inch pots with the use of peat, and the small starters should be exposed to indirect but full sunlight. It is suggested that you begin to grow your seedlings sometime around the middle of March, as they will need up to 12 weeks to get ready for outdoor exposure. Eggplant is very, very sensitive to even the slightest mist of frost, making them a bit fragile and difficult to manage for those who are green thumb challenged.
Your next lesson on how to grow eggplant will be a slow and deliberate introduction period to the somewhat more harsh world of the outdoors. Beginning with three or four hours per day, take your young eggplants outdoors and place their pots in an area where sun and wind will affect them. As you gradually increase the amount of outdoor exposure for your seedlings, you will eventually have them out up to ten hours per day, bringing them indoors at night until all danger of frost is gone. This usually occurs by mid June, though ideally your eggplants will have more time to mature throughout the summer months.
Once these steps toward how to grow eggplant have been achieved, you will be ready to transplant them into your prepared ground. An important note: do not plant your eggplant where there was cabbage, tomatoes, peppers, strawberries, or raspberries the year before. High acid levels are very destructive to your tender little eggplants, so use careful prevention methods in order to increase your chances at success. Your eggplants are ready to be harvested when they have reached a firm and shiny texture, but while the vine and stem are still moist.