When to sow eggplants?
- Botanical name
- Solanum melongena
- Family
- Solanaceae
Eggplants are sown indoors from February to March, 0.6 cm deep. They germinate in 12 to 15 days. They are harvested from August to October.
Eggplants are annual plants. The edible part is the fruit.
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Eggplants through the year
- indoor sowing
- transplanting
- harvest
In short
The last frost is not on the same day everywhere, so the recorded weeks are a guide and not a date.
Growing conditions
Companions in the bed
Companion planting is tradition and not an agronomic claim. What is recorded is which pairs sources recommend and which they advise against.
Space used well: the parsley stays low under the aubergine.
- “Cited” means the pair is named by one source or two.
Pests and diseases
Listed here is every problem for which the sources name this plant as a host. The problems are not listed in order of how common they are.
Blossom end rot
disorder- Signs
- At the blossom end of the fruit there is a watery, then dark, sunken and leathery patch. It is not a disease and does not pass from plant to plant, it is a sign that calcium never reached the fruit.
- Prevention
- Even moisture in the soil is the main measure: mulch and deep watering instead of a little and often. No excess nitrogen. Lime after a soil test, so that the calcium in the soil is available at all.
- What to do
- Remove the affected fruit. The next fruits come clean once the moisture steadies. A calcium spray gives temporary relief at best and does not replace watering.
Colorado potato beetle
pest- Signs
- Adult beetles and reddish larvae eat the leaves until nothing is left of the plant but bare stems. Once the foliage runs out they start on the stems as well. The yellow eggs sit in tight clusters on the underside of the leaves.
- Prevention
- Keep to a rotation, because the beetle overwinters in the soil exactly where the attacked crop stood. Lay a thick straw mulch, which makes its way to the plants harder and draws in predators. Look for the egg clusters early, while there are few of them.
- What to do
- Collect and destroy beetles, larvae and egg clusters, often and early in the season. Put the fleece on before the beetles come out of the soil. The aubergine is the beetle's favourite host.
Flea beetles
pest- Signs
- The leaves are riddled with small round holes, as if somebody had peppered them with shot. Touched, the beetles jump. Young plants with such leaves stall or die, older ones grow through the damage.
- Prevention
- Clear away the plant debris in which the beetles overwinter. Cover the bed with fleece right after sowing or planting and leave it until the plants are strong. Keep the soil moist, because a dry warm spring is the worst case.
- What to do
- Pin fleece down at the edges, which is the main measure. In autumn or early spring loosen the top layer of soil to cut down the number of overwintering beetles. On the aubergine the fleece should be stretched over hoops.
Slugs and snails
pest- Signs
- Holes appear in the middle of the leaf rather than along the edge, young plants are eaten down to the ground, and there are slimy trails in the morning. On low-growing fruit there are gnawed pits.
- Prevention
- Remove the hiding places beside the bed: boards, stones, dense weeds. Water in the morning and not in the evening, so that the night is dry. Spread a band of coarse sand or gravel around the bed. Cover young plants with fleece. Pick them off at night, which is still the most effective measure.
Keep track of your plants with Tendask
Log the task and set a reminder for the next one. Every plant keeps its own history, so there is nothing to guess at.
Related plants
The plants below are in the same botanical family (Solanaceae).
Sources about the plant: Alabama Cooperative Extension System, GBIF Backbone Taxonomy, KGZS Zavod Ljubljana, KGZS Zavod Nova Gorica, NC State Extension Plant Toolbox, Royal Horticultural Society, Semenarna Ljubljana, Smernice za strokovno utemeljeno gnojenje (Mihelič et al., MKGP 2011), University of Maryland Extension, Utah State University Extension, Wikidata. Checked between 14 and 28 August 2026. The problem descriptions also draw on: Clemson Cooperative Extension, EPPO Global Database, University of Wisconsin-Madison Division of Extension.