When to remove beets from the garden for storage

There are a number of vegetables that can be found in any vegetable garden, and beets are just such vegetables. The amount of vitamins and useful elements in this root vegetable is amazing: folic acid, B vitamins, magnesium and potassium, iodine and iron, and much more. And most importantly, all these useful substances are not lost in the process of cooking beets, and this is really a rarity. Add to this a small amount of calories and we can rightfully call beets one of the healthiest vegetables.
Beets are used for making salads, vinaigrette, but of course the most important beetroot dish is borscht. This is one of the few garden crops in which both tops and roots can be eaten, and beet tops are very useful (and, of course, beautiful). Beets can be canned, frozen, squeezed out of extremely healthy juice, and kept fresh for several months. Beets are very unpretentious, it is not at all difficult to grow them. It is important to remove the beets from the beds in a timely manner, and carefully prepare the roots for storage. By creating the right conditions, you can keep the vitamin-rich product without any additional processing until next spring.

When to harvest beets

It is impossible to unequivocally determine the time when it is necessary to remove the beets from the beds, as this depends on several factors. In southern regions with short winters, spring comes earlier, and therefore garden work starts earlier. And in cooler regions, the climatic spring comes later than the calendar one, so the sowing dates are shifted, which means that the harvest will have to be harvested later.

The timing of harvesting also depends on which variety you have chosen: early maturing, ripening in 2-2.5 months; mid-season, ripening in about 3 months; or late, which will take from 3.5 to 4.5 months to ripen. It is just such late varieties that are practically not planted in Siberia or the Urals, because they simply do not have time to ripen there, and beets, caught by even the most minimal frosts, can be processed, but are unsuitable for long-term storage.

For beginners, the question often arises of how fundamentally it is to comply with the harvesting dates indicated for this particular variety, whether it is possible to pull out the beets earlier, or, conversely, overexpose them in the ground for an extra 2-3 weeks. But any experienced gardener will tell you that beets begin to grow rapidly just with the onset of September, when the summer heat recedes. Therefore, if you are counting on large fruits, then you should wait until the announced date. Well, if we talk about the beneficial substances contained in beets, then their highest concentration occurs precisely at the moment of full ripening, this is another argument in favor of waiting. But if you delay harvesting and the first frosts hit (even if minimal), then the tops and protruding part of the beets will freeze a little, and you cannot store such root crops, since they begin to deteriorate rather quickly.

Sometimes you have to harvest earlier than planned for reasons beyond your control. Such reasons may be the appearance of a large number of rodents in the garden, which can cause significant damage to the crop. Weather conditions can also make adjustments - in case of a large amount of precipitation, you should choose the first dry day and start harvesting, because from prolonged rains, the roots will lose their taste, they can begin to crack, and then rot.

And of course, in addition to the terms indicated when buying seeds, and weather conditions, you need to focus on external signs, by which you can easily understand whether it is time to harvest the beets, or it is worth waiting a little longer.

First, the roots must reach the size specified in the variety description. The size can be determined by the tops sticking out of the ground, or you can pull out a couple of medium root crops and orient yourself along them.

Secondly, the lowest leaves begin to turn yellow and dry out, and this has nothing to do with any disease, as all the tops look healthy. And thirdly, the skin on the top of the root crop becomes denser and small growths may appear on it (this is not a pathology, so there is no need to be afraid of such growths).

How to harvest beets and prepare them for storage

Harvesting should always be done in dry and sunny weather. You can pull out the beets with your hands, dig in them with a pitchfork or a shovel - that's as convenient as anyone. The main thing is to preserve the integrity of root crops, because only vegetables without mechanical damage and signs of disease are suitable for storage.

Pull the beets out, free them of any residual soil, and then rip or trim the tops. But then the opinions of gardeners diverge. Some argue that it is necessary not only to cut the tops, but also to remove the growth points, that is, to cut off part of the fruit. If this is not done, then the beets will begin to sprout during storage, which means that the root crop itself will wither. Other gardeners recommend cutting off the tops, leaving centimeter petioles, and some recommend cutting off the tail, leaving just a couple of centimeters.

Which method of preparing root crops for storage is right for you can only be found out empirically. Try to divide the root vegetables into two parts and prepare them in different ways, by the spring it will be clear which ones were stored better.

After you have dealt with the tops, sort the root vegetables: put aside the damaged and deformed ones - they will go for food and processing, and sort the healthy and strong ones by size - you will put them in storage. Size sorting is necessary because large beets are stored for less time than small and medium beets, so they must be placed separately and used first.

Where and how to store root vegetables

So, you have grown a rich harvest of beets, harvested it and what to do next? The harvested beets can be canned (for example, make a fantastic borscht dressing), frozen, or kept fresh for food throughout fall, winter, and possibly spring.

What should you pay attention to when storing crops? First of all, the temperature in the room where the storage will be carried out - it must be stable at + 2 ... + 3 degrees, not higher or lower. At a lower temperature, vegetables will freeze, and an increase in temperature stimulates the growth of tops, which means that the root crop will soon become stuck. In addition to the temperature, it is necessary to maintain a high humidity of the air, about 90 percent. In a dry room, beets will lose moisture, become soft and unsuitable for food.

The room in which the crop is stored must be ventilated. As a rule, cellars, basements, glazed balconies are used for this purpose. Beets can be stored in bags, spread out on the floor in bulk, or stacked in wooden or plastic boxes, sprinkling vegetables with wet sand.

In the process of growing, beets require virtually no maintenance and do not cause any trouble for the gardener. However, harvesting and distributing it for storage will take a little tinkering. But believe me, it's worth it, and, most likely, next year you will plant even more tasty and healthy roots.