Why are tomatoes white inside? Why can tomatoes be red on the outside but white on the inside? What's in the store

When growing tomatoes in your garden plots, you always want to get beautiful, healthy fruits with excellent taste. However, it often happens differently. Everything seems to be fine outwardly, but when we cut into the fruit, we see white veins, inclusions of white color, or even a half-white center. The fruits have no special taste and are somewhat harsh. Thoughts about diseases and mutations come to mind.

tomatoRamesh NG / Flickr.com

This is also sometimes the case with tomatoes sold in stores. We buy a fruit that looks attractive, but at home we are disappointed. We know who to blame for the tomato defects in purchased tomatoes, but we would like to figure it out with the tomatoes grown in our beds. Why is this happening?

First of all, to avoid this problem, when purchasing seeds, pay attention to varietal characteristics. Be careful not to come across a hybrid with a “long-term gene,” of which there are plenty in modern breeding. They are grown specifically for sale. The longevity gene helps the tomato be stored for a long time and not be damaged during transportation. The apparently beautiful fruit actually turns out to be tasteless with an alarming white center.

There is only one way out, use it for sowing proven varieties, of which there are quite a lot in our shopping centers. Buy seeds from reliable suppliers.

True, varieties created specifically for canning and pickling also have features in the form of a partially white core.

There is another reason why tomatoes suffer from tastelessness, grow white inside and hard. This virus, so-called stolbur or, in another way phytoplasmosis. Let me make a reservation right away: the disease is incurable. How to determine that tomatoes are affected by this disease?

tomatoeswww.tOrange.biz Valdema / Flickr.com

If you are attentive to your tomato bushes, you should be wary when, before the fruits appear, the leaves begin to change - they become smaller, coarser, and bend upward. Pinkish or violet shades appear, the stem thickens. When flowering, the flower petals become thinner, smaller, and turn green. The stamens and pistil are also small and underdeveloped. Sometimes the flower becomes sterile. Well, if the fruit has grown, then naturally its taste is worse than ever - the flesh is hard, white and completely tasteless. The fruits are not suitable for eating.

If the disease affects the entire plant, the leaves turn yellow and fall off.

The virus is usually carried by pests: aphids, cutworms, cicadas, and whiteflies.

The virus often lives on the roots of weeds, so insect control, regular weeding will help tomatoes not get sick. Choose low-growing, standard varieties, their disease affects them to a lesser extent.

Plants infected with stolbur are immediately removed from the garden bed and burned.

Sometimes the reason why tomatoes turn white inside and are hard is nutritional imbalance– there is an excess of nitrogen, and a deficiency of calcium and potassium. Timely feeding of plants will help fill the gap. Experienced gardeners know that if a burn appears on the lower leaves along the edges, the fruits are unevenly colored, you need to add potassium. If there is a lack of calcium, the upper leaves dry out and the plants begin to suffer from blossom end rot.

However, it should be taken into account that at a temperature of +30°C and above, potassium is not absorbed from the soil by plants. Flowers are sterilized, fruits are not formed. To ensure that your efforts are not in vain, ventilate the greenhouses and lower the temperature. At the same time, increase the air humidity in the greenhouse by watering.

High temperatures and moisture deficiency in the soil prevents the formation of lycopene in tomatoes, a pigment that is responsible for the redness of the fruit. The pulp of such fruits is light and tasteless.

Only proven varieties, careful care of your favorite tomatoes and comfortable conditions will save you from unexpected surprises. The tomatoes will be of excellent color and quality. And the taste will not be spoiled by white streaks and spots.

The reasons for the appearance of white pulp in tomatoes are: stolbur, or phytoplasmosis.

Column of tomato and pepper

Symptoms of stolbur: the first signs appear on young leaves, which become pinkish, the leaf blades become smaller, coarser, and the edges bend upward.

The stem may thicken

The flower clusters grow upward, the petals become smaller and greener, the calyx grows together and looks like a bell. The flowers are sterile.

Tomato and pepper fruits are unevenly colored, tasteless, and their flesh is hard and whitish.

As the disease progresses, chlorosis affects all leaves of the plant. The leaves wither and fall off.

Stolbur affects tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, eggplants, tobacco and many weeds.

Tomato and pepper stolbur are least affected by standard varieties.

Measures to combat stolbur: viral diseases are practically untreatable. Losses are especially high when celery is damaged in the early stages.

Diseased plants with mosaic symptoms should be removed immediately.

It is necessary to remove all weeds, even between rows, and fight aphids in a timely manner (spray with insecticides).

It is important to properly grow healthy pepper, tomato and eggplant seedlings.

Regular watering and loosening of the soil after watering are necessary.

Cause of illness:Viral disease.

Viruses are spread by cicadas.

viral diseases of tomato and pepper diseases of tomato pepper (photo)

How to avoid white pulp in tomatoes...

Why do tomatoes often have white flesh inside (very hard and tasteless), although the fruit itself is red and beautiful?
Tatiana Petrova.
Uneven coloring of the peel and pulp of tomato fruits can be caused by an infectious (physiological) disease. It occurs due to sharp fluctuations in temperature, humidity and lighting in the greenhouse, as well as a lack of potassium and calcium with excessive application of nitrogen. Weakly colored spots (tissues lose their ability to accumulate dyes) appear on fruits and parts of them that are strongly illuminated and heated by the sun.
During the flowering period and 10 days before it, the temperature should be below plus 35 degrees and above plus 15. Otherwise, the formation of lycopene, the pigment that determines the red color of fruits, as well as carotene, stops.
It is very important to maintain lower night temperatures, especially during fruit growth. It should be lower than the daily value so that the excess assimilates accumulated during the day (end products of photosynthetic fixation and reduction of carbon dioxide in plants) are not spent on respiration at night.
In hot weather, plant roots also suffer. They stop absorbing potassium from the soil, which is necessary for the synthesis of lycopene. Therefore, the optimal soil temperature should be maintained within plus 20-25 degrees.
To obtain high-quality fruits, it is desirable that the greenhouse have optimal temperature and humidity and apply moderate doses of nitrogen fertilizers. In hot weather, intensively ventilate greenhouses and shade the covering (spray with chalk or cover with white paper).
When growing tomatoes in open ground, the soil must be mulched. And, most importantly, increase potassium and calcium nutrition (50 g of ammonia and potassium nitrate per 1 sq. m) before flowering and fruit set. These elements should be added along with watering.

Why are my tomatoes turning red with large, hard white veins inside?

Growing tomatoes in a summer cottage

If, with such signs, there are green, unripe parts of the stalk, it can be assumed that there is a lack of potassium. If all the fruits turn red entirely, without green butts, it makes sense to check for nitrates. There may simply be an imbalance in some other nutritional element.

I also noticed that when the weather is cold at night for a long time, some of the fruits come out with white woody pulp in the center.

Bacterial diseases of tomato and cucumber in protected soil

The prevalence of stolbur in the region reaches 100%, and its harmfulness lies in a sharp decrease in the yield and quality of tomatoes.

To protect tomatoes from disease, it is recommended to destroy perennial weeds near tomato plantations (in and around greenhouses), systematically combat pathogen vectors (especially leafhoppers, whiteflies, aphids and bollworms); for this purpose, effectively use such a low-hazard drug as phytoverm (bioinsecticide ). It is also necessary to treat plants with tetracycline antibiotics (for example, phytoplasmin) at intervals of once every two weeks. In this case, it is advisable to combine these two protective agents in the form of a tank mixture. Beginning of treatment with insecticides - from the moment of planting the seedlings, it is better to spray with antibiotics at the beginning of flowering, but the frequency is no more than two or three, and then it is necessary to use other drugs - such as pharmacoid (with a concentration of 0.05%) or the well-known Bordeaux mixture. To increase plant immunity, it is necessary to fertilize with organic and complex mineral fertilizers

Stolbur, or phytoplasmosis

Pathogen
Solanaceae phytoplasma
Pathogen biology
The infection is transmitted by leafhoppers. In the spring, 2-7 days after feeding on infected weeds, leafhoppers become able to transmit infection to tomato plants or other nightshade plants.
Sources of infection
Phytoplasma overwinters in the rhizomes of affected weeds and other perennial plants, for example, bindweed, thistle, plantain, St. John's wort, elderberry, etc.
Symptoms
The leaf segments are small, chlorotic, often with a pinkish or purple tint. The flowers are deformed: the sepals are overgrown, often fused; the internal parts of the flower are reduced - the pistil is shortened, the stamens are underdeveloped, the petals are smaller, discolored or green in color. The fruits are woody. Their section reveals white, highly developed vascular tissue. There are numerous cracks on the surface of the root, the bark acquires a brown tint, and strong lignification of the internal tissues of the root is observed.
Maliciousness
The harmfulness of stolbur is expressed in a decrease in yield and a decrease in the content of dry substances, which leads to a deterioration in the commercial quality of the fruit.
Agrotechnical measures
Destruction of weeds - phytoplasma reserves near fields, including herbicides. They are used before the crop emerges or after the crop emerges.

Spraying plants with insecticides(AKTARA, ACTELLIK, KARATE ZEON, PROTEUS, CALIPSO, OPERKOT,)to destroy imago leafhoppers during their appearance in the open ground. In the southern regions of Russia, the period of field cultivation falls on the period from May 10 to May 30.

At the first signs of a lesion, they are treated with biological preparations.(PLANRIS + TRICHODERMIN).In seedling greenhouses, plants are sprayed with insecticides before planting them in the field.

When planting tomatoes in his summer cottage or in a greenhouse, every gardener expects to harvest the fruit, as in the picture on the bag of seeds. But expectations are not always justified. Sometimes you have to wait an endlessly long time for a tomato to ripen completely: the fruits do not want to turn red at the branch, and even when the flesh at the top becomes completely soft and red, the “shoulders” remain hard and green. A similar problem is almost always accompanied by another symptom: on a cut tomato, light veins are clearly visible, which also turn out to be rough and tasteless. Such vegetables are unlikely to cause anyone's appetite. We invite readers of the New Domostroy website to figure out why tomatoes become white and hard inside, and only half ripen. Of course, we will not only list the possible causes of this scourge, but also tell you what to do to get rid of it.

Varietal features

The rarest, but still possible reason for the appearance of white pulp of tomatoes or their uneven ripening is the varietal characteristics of the plant. At the same time, both symptoms, if the cause of the problem is precisely the unusual variety, do not appear. And the manifestation of the symptom itself is weakly expressed. For example, the very “shoulders” may remain greenish, but the flesh inside remains appetizing. If there are light inclusions in the pulp, they are usually small and have almost no effect on the organoleptic qualities of the vegetable.

There is only one way to get rid of this reason - to grow some other variety in the future.

Lack of microelements

Uneven ripening of fruits and at the same time the presence of white, hard veins inside them is often caused by a lack of potassium, calcium and magnesium (mainly potassium). This can happen even if there are enough of these elements in the soil. Why are tomatoes starving? There could be several reasons for this.

Too hot

At high temperatures (from 35 degrees), tomatoes lose the ability to absorb potassium, as a result of which they fail to ripen at the stalk. At the same time, tomatoes stop producing lycopene. This element is responsible for the production of red pigment (by the way, it is this element that makes tomatoes help fight cancer and helps maintain youth).

Little light

If the plantings are very dense or if the green mass grows too much, the tomatoes at the base may not have enough light. This negatively affects both the formation of lycopene and the absorption of potassium and magnesium.

Excess nitrogen

Many gardeners fertilize tomatoes too generously with manure, which contains a lot of nitrogen, or abuse mineral fertilizers rich in this element. With an excess of nitrogen, tomatoes absorb potassium, calcium and magnesium worse, with all the ensuing consequences.

Lack of moisture

If the summer turns out to be dry, and you are not able to water the beds with tomatoes as often and as abundantly as required, the absorption of nutrients from the soil by the roots becomes difficult. As a result, the tomatoes do not ripen completely and are light and hard inside.

Failure to fertilize

If you have not added mineral fertilizers to the soil this season, the tomatoes will almost certainly “starve.” This will negatively affect the speed of their maturation.

How to diagnose potassium deficiency

If the tomatoes are white and hard inside, only half ripen (do not turn red at the stem), then all the signs of potassium starvation are evident. But if you need further evidence, inspect the leaves. If you observe a marginal burn on the lower leaves, then the plant is clearly lacking potassium.

What to do to solve the problem

A number of measures can be proposed to solve the problem of uneven ripening of tomatoes and whitening of their flesh for physiological reasons.

If you grow tomatoes in a greenhouse, try whitewashing the roof.
Do not overfeed tomatoes with nitrogen; rely on potash fertilizers. Feed the bushes with a complex mineral fertilizer with a high potassium content and low nitrogen content (or better yet, no nitrogen at all).
Normalize the watering regime.

In the future, try not to plant tomato bushes too close to each other. If your weather is often too hot, give preference to varieties with a short ripening period.

Viral disease

White rough veins inside, uneven ripening (when only the top of the fruit turns red) - these signs belong to the symptoms of phytoplasmosis. It is also called stolbur.

If stolbur has affected your tomatoes, then you will be able to observe a number of other unpleasant symptoms (or at least some of them):

leaves on tomatoes become smaller;
the greens begin to take on a pink-violet hue;
leaves bend upward;
the stems thicken;
flower petals become small, light, often grow together, becoming like bells;
many of the flowers turn out to be sterile, which is why the harvest is poor, and the ripe fruits are rarely large in size.

Similar symptoms are observed on plants of the nightshade family adjacent to tomatoes (celery, pepper).

If you are faced with phytoplasmosis, then you need to know that this viral disease is incurable and extremely contagious to other plants. Affected bushes must be promptly disposed of by burning them outside the garden.

The carriers of the disease are insect pests, so the prevention of phytoplasmosis includes the fight against aphids, the ants that protect them and other insects that are dangerous to tomatoes. For this, insecticides are used, but, of course, not during the fruiting period.

Is it possible to eat unripe tomatoes with white flesh?

Perhaps some of the readers of our online magazine “New Domostroy” are concerned about the question of whether it is possible to eat unripe fruits with white pulp.

If white areas inside the fruit appear for genetic or physiological reasons, this does not make the fruit harmful or hazardous to health. The only thing is that they will contain less useful substances than you expect, and such vegetables do not taste very pleasant.

Tomato viruses are not terrible for humans, and if you do not suffer from too good an imagination, you can eat infected fruits raw, pickled, or stewed. Another thing is that you are unlikely to want to eat such “monsters” as food.

Important: before eating unripe tomatoes, the green “roof” must be cut off - it contains a lot of solanine, which is a toxic substance.

If the tomatoes are white and hard inside, and only half ripen without turning red at the stem, you can eat them, although it will not be very pleasant. The cause of this unpleasant phenomenon may be the genetic characteristics of certain varieties of tomatoes, phytoplasmosis, weather conditions or improper care, accompanied by a lack of potassium. Not all of these reasons can be eliminated by the farmer, but he can still influence many factors. By taking the measures recommended in this material, you will solve the problem partially or completely.

Tomato care one of the important tasks of gardeners. How much competent care will receive plants tomatoes at different stages of development, the harvest will ripen better and more abundantly.

Some important tips from experienced gardeners tomato care will help you cope with many problems that await tomatoes throughout the development and growth of plants.

Tomato- an important, pot-bellied lord in our areas. Without him, the table is empty and the garden is not beautiful! By the way, in Europe and North America it is the second most consumed food after potatoes. First of all, the tomato is very rich in potassium, which removes excess fluid from the body and is good for the heart, as well as magnesium, which helps the body adapt to the cold.

In addition, it contains useful iron and zinc, thanks to which hair and skin cells grow and wounds heal faster. Tomato also contains calcium, which strengthens bones, and phosphorus, which helps the normal course of metabolic processes; a large amount of organic acids and vitamins, especially vitamin C. It is also capable of producing the “happiness hormone” in the body - serotonin. So let's talk how to grow a tomato correctly- “happiness” in the garden!

Important information about watering tomatoes

In dry weather, plants are watered at the roots (regular or drip watering).

! Sprinkling has a negative effect on flowering, causes flowers to fall off, and delays fruit set and ripening. In addition, air humidity increases, which leads to the appearance and spread of fungal diseases.

When the fruits reach a diameter of 1-2 cm, the water consumption for each square meter of the bed is increased to 5-12 liters, watered 1-2 times every 7-10 days.
After severe drying of the soil, it is impossible to immediately carry out heavy watering; the fruits may fall off, crack, or develop blossom end rot. The watering rate in this case is 0.8-1 liters per plant.

What to feed tomatoes with?

Mineral fertilizers are applied in liquid form after watering.

Included first feeding(carried out two to three weeks after planting seedlings, during the formation of ovaries on the first inflorescence), it is advisable to include superphosphate and potassium sulfate ( based on 20-25 g superphosphate and 15-20 g of potassium sulfate per 1 m2). If the soils are poor and this negatively affects plant growth, you can additionally add up to 10 g of ammonium nitrate per 1m2.
Second, and if necessary (by visual diagnostics) and
third feeding carried out during mass growth and ripening of fruits based on ( 15-20 g ammonium nitrate and 20-25 g potassium sulfate per 1 m 2).
To obtain an early harvest, they also use foliar feeding of tomatoes. For 10 liters of water: ( 16 g uric acid and potassium sulfate, 10 g of superphosphate).

Such fertilizing is often carried out in conjunction with treating plants against or. It is better to do this in the evening, when the nutrient solution applied to the leaves dries slowly, and morning dew promotes better absorption.

In order to prevent the spread of fungal diseases, 2-3 times per season, in the second half of July, plants are treated with copper-containing preparations: Bordeaux mixture, copper oxychloride, etc.

Why are tomatoes hollow and small?

If hollow tomato fruits form(with internal voids), poor pollination is to blame. This happens due to high (more than 35°C) or low (below 12°C) air temperature.

What affects hollowness and moisture? Tomato pollen is heavy; in the humid (more than 85%) air of greenhouses, it does not fall out easily from the anthers of flowers. Therefore, it is necessary to lightly shake the plants several times a week in the morning for better pollination of flowers and fruit set, as well as regularly ventilate the greenhouse.

Reasons for crushing fruits: an abundance of stepsons, low light, lack of potassium (as well as nitrogen or phosphorus), a large difference in day and night temperatures.

30-40 days after planting the seedlings on sunny days, the lower leaves of the plants are periodically removed in the morning. By the time the fruits on the first inflorescence ripen, there should be no leaves at all on the stem below it. Then they continue to be removed, but not above the 2-3rd inflorescence. Moreover, in a week you cannot remove more than two or three leaves from tall plants and one or two from short plants! These measures improve air exchange in the lower part of the tomato plant, prevent the appearance and spread of late blight, and accelerate the ripening of fruits.

Something about planting tomatoes

Growing tomatoes carried out regularly once every 7-10 days. Depending on the variety, plants are formed into one or two or three stems. All other shoots (preferably still small, 3-5 cm) growing in the axils of the leaves, both on the main shoot and on the side shoots, are removed. By the way, these stepsons quickly grow roots and can be planted in the ground.

Formation of tomato plants in one or two stems leaving two to four inflorescences contributes to the ripening of products 12-20 days earlier than without pinching.

Universal fertilizer for tomatoes

Suitable for different varieties of tomatoes, different in shape and color!

The seedlings are planted in a film greenhouse in holes up to the top of the head, having previously torn off all the lower leaves. Water generously when planting, then during planting, and a third time during the period of mass flowering. Moreover, a special feeding solution is prepared for flowering plants.

10 liter bucket 2 kg ash pour 5 liters of boiling water, stir and let cool. Then add plain water to the brim of the bucket, pour out a small (pharmacy) bubble iodine and a bag (10g) of boric acid, they insist for a day. 1 liter of infusion is diluted in a bucket of water, then 1 liter of working solution is poured under the root for each plant.

This supplement is rich in microelements. Therefore, tomatoes bear fruit faster and better, and practically do not suffer from late blight.

Medicines for late blight

At the first signs of late blight, treat tomatoes with a solution of metronidazole (an analogue of Trichopolum) and medicinal brilliant green.

The first drug allows you to destroy the causative agent of a fungal disease, the second one - to treat plants. It turns out that in this way you can grow environmentally friendly products.

20 minutes before treatment, I dissolve 15 tablets in a cup. metronidazole, then pour this concentrate into a 10-liter bucket of water, add pharmaceutical bottle of brilliant green. Pour the working solution into a spray bottle and treat the leaves from below and above (or better yet, the entire plant). To prevent late blight, it is advisable to carry out the first treatment at the beginning of summer; 10 metronidazole tablets per bucket of water is enough.

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Symptoms of stolbur: the first signs appear on young leaves, which become pinkish, the leaf blades become smaller, coarser, and the edges bend upward.

The stem may thicken.

The flower clusters grow upward, the petals become smaller and greener, the calyx grows together and looks like a bell. The flowers are sterile.

Tomato and pepper fruits are unevenly colored, tasteless, and their flesh is hard and whitish.

As the disease progresses, chlorosis affects all leaves of the plant. The leaves wither and fall off.

Stolbur affects tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, eggplants, tobacco and many weeds.

The standard varieties of tomato and pepper are least affected by stolbur.

Measures to combat stolbur: viral diseases are practically untreatable. Losses are especially high when celery is damaged in the early stages.

Diseased plants with mosaic symptoms should be removed immediately.

It is necessary to remove all weeds, even between rows, and fight aphids in a timely manner (spray with insecticides).

It is important to properly grow healthy pepper, tomato and eggplant seedlings.

Regular watering and loosening of the soil after watering are necessary.

Cause of the disease: Viral disease.

Viruses are spread by cicadas.

Viral diseases of tomato and pepper diseases of tomato pepper photo

How to avoid white pulp in tomatoes...

Please tell me why the tomatoes turned red and there are large, large, hard white veins inside?

Hello Tomato Scientist.
Please tell me why the tomatoes turned red and there are large, large, hard white veins inside?

Hello, Elena.
If, with such signs, there are green unripe parts at the stalk, it can be assumed that there is a lack of potassium. If all the fruits turn red entirely, without green butts, it makes sense to check for nitrates. There may simply be an imbalance in some other nutritional element.
I also noticed that when the weather is cold at night for a long time, some of the fruits come out with white woody pulp in the center.

Bacterial diseases of tomato and cucumber in protected soil

The prevalence of stolbur in the region reaches 100%, and its harmfulness lies in a sharp decrease in the yield and quality of tomatoes.

To protect tomatoes from disease, it is recommended to destroy perennial weeds near tomato plantations (in and around greenhouses), to systematically combat pathogen vectors (especially leafhoppers, whiteflies, aphids and bollworms); for this purpose, effectively use such a low-hazard drug as phytoverm (bioinsecticide) . It is also necessary to treat plants with tetracycline antibiotics (for example, phytoplasmin) at intervals of once every two weeks. In this case, it is advisable to combine these two protective agents in the form of a tank mixture. Beginning of treatment with insecticides - from the moment the seedlings are planted, it is better to spray with antibiotics at the beginning of flowering, but the frequency is no more than two or three, and then it is necessary to use other drugs - such as pharmacoid (with a concentration of 0.05%) or the well-known Bordeaux mixture. To increase plant immunity, it is necessary to fertilize with organic and complex mineral fertilizers

Stolbur, or phytoplasmosis

Pathogen
Solanaceae phytoplasma
Pathogen biology
The infection is transmitted by leafhoppers. In the spring, 2–7 days after feeding on infected weeds, leafhoppers become able to transmit infection to tomato plants or other nightshades.
Sources of infection
Phytoplasma overwinters in the rhizomes of affected weeds and other perennial plants, for example, bindweed, thistle, plantain, St. John's wort, elderberry, etc.
Symptoms
The leaf segments are small, chlorotic, often with a pinkish or purple tint. The flowers are deformed: the sepals are overgrown, often fused; the internal parts of the flower are reduced - the pistil is shortened, the stamens are underdeveloped, the petals are smaller, discolored or green in color. The fruits are woody. Their section reveals white, highly developed vascular tissue. There are numerous cracks on the surface of the root, the bark acquires a brown tint, and strong lignification of the internal tissues of the root is observed.
Maliciousness
The harmfulness of stolbur is expressed in a decrease in yield and a decrease in the content of dry substances, which leads to a deterioration in the commercial quality of the fruit.
Agrotechnical measures
Destruction of weeds - phytoplasma reserves near fields, including herbicides. They are used before the crop emerges or after the crop emerges.
Spraying plants with insecticides (AKTARA, ACTELLIK, KARATE ZEON, PROTEUS, CALIPSO, OPERKOT) to destroy imago leafhoppers during their appearance in the open ground. In the southern regions of Russia, the period of field cultivation falls on the period from May 10 to May 30. At the first signs of lesions, they are treated with biological preparations (PLANRIS + TRICHODERMIN). In seedling greenhouses, plants should be sprayed with insecticides before planting them in the field.