The soil in the greenhouse turns green: why, what to do and how to fight mold in the garden after spring or winter + tips on what to treat

Why does the soil in a greenhouse turn green?

Among the reasons for the appearance of a green layer of soil in a greenhouse are:

Overwatering;
Excess fertilizer;
Increasing the acid balance of the soil;
Insufficient amount of fresh air in the greenhouse.

The soil can turn green due to one of the reasons listed above, or due to a combination of factors.

Excessive soil moisture

Excessive watering or increasing the amount of groundwater can lead to moss or algae appearing in the greenhouse. Both plants prefer moist soil.

The only difference is that moss grows well in dark places, and algae grows well on the sunny side.

In addition, the spores of these plants can be introduced with irrigation water, wind or melt water, and only then reproduce in a humid microclimate favorable to them.

Overfertilization

Excessive use of phosphorus fertilizers also causes greening of the soil. Any fertilizer must be applied strictly following the instructions on the package. Otherwise, excess phosphorus also contributes to the appearance of moss.

Increased acidity

In soil with a high level of acidity, parasitic plants, primarily moss plants, actively develop. They take root best in acidic soil, grow quickly and, as a result, consume all the useful microelements, preventing garden crops from developing properly.

Lack of ventilation

The heifer perfectly protects plants from external negative factors.

However, it is important to remember that plants need to constantly breathe.
Therefore, it is important to ensure constant ventilation in the greenhouse.

Lack of fresh air contributes to the rapid proliferation of moss and algae spores.

Let's take a closer look at the “enemy”: is it moss or algae?

Green soil can appear in a greenhouse for several reasons:

Increased soil acidity.
Poor ventilation.
Waterlogging of the soil.
Excess fertilizer.

Mosses and algae are plants that love a moist environment. Both too much watering and nearby groundwater under the beds can lead to their proliferation. So, if there is not enough light in the greenhouse, then moss will begin to grow with high humidity. And if it’s light, then there’s algae.

Therefore, here is what you need to do first if the soil in your greenhouse suddenly turns green:

Step 1. Completely stop watering the plants.
Step 2. Let's take a closer look at what exactly grew in the beds and gives the green color.
Step 3. If it turns out that it is moss, we direct additional lighting or sunlight onto it using a large mirror, and open the windows.
Step 4. If the culprits of the green color of the beds are algae, protect such beds from the sun as much as possible, and cover them with a layer of sawdust or sand on top. We ventilate the greenhouse well.

These are the first steps. What else needs to be done - read on.

Emergency help if the soil in the greenhouse turns green

Emergency measures in case of detection of green soil include:

Reduce watering. And if the moss has spread over the entire area of the greenhouse, then its complete cessation.
Understand what kind of weed appeared in the soil: moss or algae. If there is moss, ensure maximum access of sunlight to the greenhouse.
If there is algae, on the contrary, darken the space. To do this, they are sprinkled with sand or sawdust.
Provide active ventilation. Fresh air must constantly circulate in the greenhouse.
If you can’t get rid of the problem, garden stores have special preparations to combat mosses.

Important! You should not fight greening with copper sulfate. It destroys not only weeds, but also beneficial microorganisms and the soil becomes unsuitable for gardening. After using this drug, the soil will have to be completely replaced, otherwise all cultivated plants will die.

Consequences of soil greening

Algae and mosses compete with cultivated plants, removing nutrients from the soil. They absorb phosphorus especially actively, so an excess of phosphorus-containing fertilizers during feeding can stimulate their rapid reproduction. They can also parasitize other vegetation.

Soil covered with a green coating and elements of buildings or decor do not look aesthetically pleasing. Greening of the soil in the beds is a signal of poor soil care or increased acidity, all of which together have a negative impact on the crops grown by humans.

Important! In order not to harm the soil and plant crops, you should strictly follow the instructions for dosing copper sulfate. This substance should not be more than 1 g per 1 m².

Fighting methods

More thorough methods of struggle include:

Removing the top layer of soil

This is the most radical and effective way to combat mosses and algae. It requires a lot of labor and time, so it should be used only as a last resort.

The soil can be replaced in the spring, before planting, or in the fall, when the harvest has already been harvested.

Stages of work:

Remove approximately 30 cm of topsoil;
Apply quicklime to the resulting clean layer;
After 24 hours, water the soil with running water;
As a result, the soil should be completely covered with a white coating, which must be left for 2-3 days;
After complete drying, lay a new top layer of soil.

This treatment will destroy all spores remaining in the lower layers and prevent re-greening.

Mulching

Mulch helps maintain optimal soil and air moisture levels in the greenhouse. This prevents weeds from developing.

In addition, mulching the soil for the winter allows you to saturate it with beneficial microorganisms and increase the yield next year.
Sawdust or grass, as well as hay and compost, are suitable for mulching.

You should use pine needles with caution, because... they help increase the acidity of the soil, and in an acidic environment, mosses reproduce more actively.

Only abundantly watered soil should be mulched. After watering, it is necessary to loosen the soil near the plants and then lay mulch. To ensure good air flow to the roots, you need to leave a distance of several centimeters between the covering and the stem.

Reducing acidity levels

Before starting work, it is necessary to determine the acidity level. For this use:

Litmus paper, which can be purchased at a gardening store;
A soil meter is a special device that is also sold in garden stores. Allows you to measure acidity level, humidity, lighting and soil temperature.
Take the sample to an agrochemical laboratory. The procedure is time-consuming and expensive, but specialists will be able to conduct a thorough soil analysis and provide reliable data.
Traditional method: brew currant leaf in a glass container. A handful of earth is dipped into the cooled infusion. If the acidity is high, the water will turn red, if the acidity is neutral, it will turn green, and if the acidity is low, it will turn blue.

To reduce the acidity level, slaked lime, wood ash, lime flour, ground chalk, and dolomite flour are used.

You can also plant plants such as mustard or oats to reduce acidity.

To increase efficiency, you can combine several methods at the same time. For example, add dolomite flour and ash, fertilize with cow manure and mulch with sawdust or hay. And a week after mulching, plant mustard or oats.

Is the greenhouse soil covered with moss?

So, you have determined that the soil in the greenhouse has turned green due to moss. Let's say that moss is a fairly peaceful plant, and it is often specially grown. But moss is included in the classification of weeds for a reason - it will still have a negative impact on the harvest. If there is not much moss yet, just scrape it off and throw away the removed layers.

Reason #1. Ideal conditions created

Let's first check if the conditions for the appearance of moss are created in your greenhouse:

Step 1. Take some earth in your hand and look at it. If it crumbles reluctantly, it means it is still waterlogged. In this case, simply add sand to the soil and aerate it, and where there is the most moss, make additional depressions and fill them with river sand.
Step 2: Now test the soil for pH value. If it is acidified, then moss will grow on it with a brown bottom and a green top. Is this the case? Restore the acid balance with dolomite flour, and apply fertilizer in the spring, because... Moss grows precisely on acidified and poor soil.
Step 3. Check to see if moss has appeared in places where you always have shade in your greenhouse? Perhaps something is shading it - a support or a tree nearby? Then place reflective foil nearby, which will illuminate this area - just as they do in a thermos greenhouse. A simple and effective solution.

Reason #2. The soil is too acidic

If you determine that it is moss, then the soil is still acidic. And if the moss is not touched for several days (for example, you go to the country only on weekends), then it will spread as quickly as possible. Plants will begin to lag behind in growth, because the moss will take over all the valuable substances that it finds in the soil. Therefore, act immediately, especially since this is a solvable problem. Just follow these instructions:

Step 1. First, add the ash, scattered, and do not dig it up.
Step 2. Right now, sow annual green manures - mustard, rapeseed or oilseed radish. Within a month, the soil will be covered with a continuous carpet of greenery.
Step 3. Plant your seedlings directly onto this carpet.
Step 4. As soon as it takes root, mow the green manure and leave it directly on the beds as mulch.
Step 5. After harvesting, sow green manure again, already winter, and let it remain there, even under the snow.

But let’s first figure out how often you need to apply lime fertilizers to greenhouse soil:

In normal, rich soil - once every 4-5 years.
In light soil - every 3-4 years.
In severe cases - after 5-6 years.

When applying, keep in mind that the finer the limestone you grind, the stronger its effect will be.

In one year, your greenhouse soil will be completely healed. But remember that moss often grows where the soil layer is too dense and there is a lack of nutrients. What to do? Soil aeration. Try to make holes about 10 cm deep, every 10-15 cm.

Reason #3. Moss “crept” from the frame

And finally, moss is a rather picky plant, and therefore it feels great on both stones and trees. Therefore, if its elements have already appeared in your greenhouse, carefully examine the wooden structures - are they the first to turn green? Moss can be removed using iron sulfate if it is a tree, and with a soda solution if it is a stone. Get rid of this cause of greening of the ground immediately, before the plant begins to spread in the ground.

The rapid growth of mosses is also provoked by phosphorus fertilizers, which are sometimes applied too much. And sometimes moss appears on beds that were previously treated with a herbicide such as Roundup. In this case, no additional treatment is needed - just dig up the ground and the problem will be solved.

Prevention

To avoid greening of the soil, you first need to carefully consider the location of the greenhouse. If possible, the structure should not be located in a lowland, where melt water will flow in the spring.

Installing a drip irrigation system will ensure uniform soil moisture.
It is necessary to regularly ventilate greenhouses.
And in winter, on the contrary, carefully close them so that snow does not accumulate inside.

An effective preventive measure is to annually replace the top layer before sowing.

Mulching the soil and controlling the acidity level will also prevent the appearance of moss and algae on the ground.

Increased acidity

Mosses grow especially actively in acidic soils, so it is important to determine the acidity level and take measures to restore the acid-base balance.

You can determine the acidity of the soil using indicator paper or a special device (garden meter). If you do not have a device, take the soil to a laboratory for examination. There are also traditional methods for determining acidity.

Take 5-6 blackcurrant leaves and pour a glass of boiling water. After an hour or two, when the broth has infused, a handful of earth is thrown into it, the acidity of which they want to determine. The decoction changes color. A reddish color indicates high acidity, green indicates low acidity, and a slight blue indicates neutral soil. Beetroot grows poorly in acidic soils, but sorrel thrives.

If the soil is slightly acidic, it can be fertilized with ash.
Quicklime or chalk is added to highly acidic soil.

Liming can be done with industrial lime fertilizers or natural lime, marl, or shale ash. Lime substances are added during the preparation of the greenhouse - in spring or autumn.

Lime application rate in kilograms per square meter depending on acidity and soil type

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Photos of examples of how the earth turns green in a greenhouse

What kind of moss can be found on a summer cottage

Mosses are the first plants to inhabit the earth 420 million years ago. Being descendants of green algae, they had a number of features that allowed them to survive on land.

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This determined, on the one hand, the greater vitality of bryophytes, and on the other hand, a narrow range of conditions in which they are able to grow.

Now the list of bryophytes includes more than 34 thousand species, 1822 genera, 177 families, which botany divides into three divisions:

Danger of moss for plants

In general, moss does not harm plantings, but its appearance on the site indicates that the conditions for cultivated plants are uncomfortable. In addition, it has a negative effect:

problems arise with soil drainage, it becomes more dense, making it difficult for vegetables to grow;
the acidity of the soil increases, as a result of which many crops grow very poorly, they get sick more often;
on wet soils, moisture does not evaporate, and such conditions contribute to the appearance of fungi;
mosses take nutrients from cultivated plants;
if the ground is too thickly covered with moss, then oxygen does not enter it, and seeds cannot germinate through the dense cover;
All kinds of parasites often live in dense thickets.

Marchantia liver moss is particularly dangerous, especially for greenhouses. Visually, it resembles a lichen, and its roots look like a thin cobweb. Even a small piece of this plant can cover the ground very densely. It does not allow the roots to breathe and worsens the condition of the plantings. Typically, spores of such moss are carried by Polish and Dutch seeds and bulbs.

Is it necessary to fight moss?

Many gardeners believe that moss only causes aesthetic damage, but in fact it can destroy plantings on a plot or in a greenhouse in a short time. It is a parasitic plant that reproduces very quickly, and during the growth process actively consumes carbon dioxide, liquid and nutrients. Moss disrupts gas exchange, increases soil acidity and contributes to waterlogging of the site, as a result of which useful crops suffer and the quantity and quality of the harvest decreases.

However, sometimes mossy cover can be beneficial. Some garden and garden plants require high acidity, and in order to achieve the required levels, owners of plots with slightly acidic or neutral soils purposefully plant moss. The plant has a bactericidal effect, destroys pathogenic microorganisms and fungal spores, and therefore can be used as a protective agent. And yet, in most cases, moss is considered a parasite that has a detrimental effect on crops grown in open ground or in a greenhouse.

What does soil deoxidation mean?

Deoxidation is the process when a gardener introduces substances into the soil that affect the chemical composition of the soil and change its pH towards an alkaline environment.

For most plants, the norm is pH 6.5-7 - this is a neutral composition at which plantings grow and bear fruit. Below the norm - an acidic environment, above - an alkaline environment. There are vegetable and fruit plants that can deviate for full development in a particular environment. You just need to know them.

Deoxidation with standard compounds does not occur quickly, about six months. That is why this needs to be done after harvesting, so that the land is ready by spring. Now we’ll tell you how to deoxidize the soil in the fall and how much to apply.

Utilities

Most gardeners and vegetable gardeners are surprised to see how the soil turns green in greenhouses or greenhouses. Many questions immediately arise, such as what is this, how dangerous is it for plants planted in greenhouses and what to do with all this? After all, the greenhouse and the soil in it are under the constant and close attention of the owner, it is protected from various climatic and temperature influences, so why does the ground turn green in the greenhouse? There are several reasons that can cause this not very pleasant phenomenon.

Let's figure out why the soil turns green in a greenhouse, and what methods exist to combat this phenomenon. Greening of the soil, as well as the reasons that cause it, pose a threat to both the growth and development of greenhouse plants and their productivity. As soon as green soil has been discovered, it is necessary to establish the cause that caused it and begin to act to eliminate it.