Techniques for taking care of coffee gardens: At the end of the dry season and the beginning of the rainy season is the period when coffee plants differentiate flower buds, form flowers and bloom, fruit set, and young fruits develop, which is an important stage that affects the productivity and quality of coffee. . In order for coffee gardens to grow, develop well, and have high productivity and quality, Vietnam Agricultural Extension would like to introduce to farmers a number of technical measures to care for coffee gardens in the last months of the dry season. , at the beginning of the rainy season.
1. Pest and disease prevention
Green scale aphids and mealybugs often grow very strongly during the dry season months and then gradually decrease during the rainy season months when natural enemies (insects that eat aphids) appear in abundance. Aphids suck sap from young stems and branches, weakening the tree. Aphid development is always accompanied by the presence of ants and black mold disease. Black sooty mold covers the leaf surface, preventing the plant from photosynthesizing.
During the dry season, farmers regularly check their gardens to promptly take measures to prevent aphids. Only spray pesticides on aphid-infected plants in aphid-infected gardens, do not spray preventive pesticides on aphid-free plants and aphid-free gardens to protect natural enemies. People can use one of the drugs such as Supracide, Sumithion, Ofatox…
In addition to spraying aphids, it is necessary to eliminate ant nests to prevent the spread of aphids. Ants not only protect aphids from attacks by natural enemies but also carry aphids and spread them to other plants in the garden. Particularly for mealybugs, to
increase the effectiveness of the drug, add 1% kerosene to the drug before spraying.
2. Fertilize
Only fertilize after there have been a few heavy rains and the soil is moist enough.
For phosphate fertilizer, it should be applied once at the beginning of the rainy season with an amount of 500 – 800kg/ha, by spreading evenly on the ground.
Nitrogen and potassium fertilizers can be mixed together to fertilize. Before fertilizing, dig a trench around the edge of the foliage about 20 cm wide and 10 cm deep. Then spread the fertilizer evenly around the trench and then cover it with soil. In the first round of fertilizing, you should use nitrogen fertilizer such as SA (sulphate ammonium) fertilizer. Later times, you can use nitrogen fertilizer such as urea fertilizer.
Conditions in the Central Highlands are due to heavy and concentrated rain in a number of months, so to limit leaching and save labor, people should use specialized synthetic fertilizer pellets for coffee such as NPK 16-8-16-13S; NPK 16-8-18 +7S+ B2O3 +TE … with an amount of about 1,500 – 1,800kg/ha, applied 3-4 times during the rainy season months.
3. Remove excess shoots and weeds and prune shade trees
After watering during the dry months, the excess shoots begin to grow very strongly, so they must be promptly removed to allow the tree to concentrate nutrients to nourish the fruit-bearing branches.
When the rainy season begins for about a month, prune the shade trees in the garden so that the lowest branch of the shade tree is about 3 m away from the coffee foliage, making the garden airy and limiting pests. harmful and create good conditions for photosynthesis.
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