What are your carrot growing tips?

[bower]

The only reason for straight rows afaik is ease of weeding/ ease of identifying your crop vs other germinating stuff. You could definitely maximize the bed yield by sowing all over it. Maybe I'll sow an extra row of Mokums in between my sparsey carrot rows? All carrots seem to need is an inch or two radius of space around them? Overall it would require more water too, to satisfy them all. In a farmer's field, wide row spacing also makes sure that moisture is adequate for the crop. I have a hose at the ready...

Re transplanting: The only reason I would try transplanting carrots, personally, is if I was really short of seeds and had to maximize survival for that. Or if it turned out that the carpenters were really cleaning up and mowing down every carrot sprout. Forked carrots are a big nuisance to clean/prep, although one advantage to growing your own is not having to peel them when really fresh.

[Paquebot]

Don't know if I've told the hot tip here or not, pots! Pots 15" to 18" for 10" to 12" like Candysnax and Sugarsnax. Then use well-aged horse manure for a medium. Sow as thick as in the ground and don't worry about thinning. They will self-thin and grow into an almost solid mass of full-sized carrots.

This year, 6 pots with 4 being long and two early short ones. The long ones Baltimore, Candysnax, Rainbow, and Sugarsnax. The shorties are Adelaide and Short And Sweet. Last year there were Sugarsnax which went down 12" and made a 90º turn for another 3: or 4". The pots are set several inches into the soil so the tap roots follow the water through the drainage holes.

My standard pots are 7-gallon with several 10s for the "snax". They start out full to the top with pure old manure. By old, it is black to no longer be recognizable for what it is. If I start with 10 gallons there may be only 5 or 6 left after the carrots are removed. They eat it! This year I could not get the super-aged manure so mixed 50/50 with last year's and newer "brown" manure. A bit high in nitrogen resulting in huge foliage and a few doubles so far in the Adelaide.

Martin

[Paquebot]

Another tip is what I saw one gardener do in our community gardens. Heavy prairie silt which is almost as bad as clay. He used a trenching shovel to dig a trench about 18" deep. That soil was mixed 50/50 with sand. That enabled him to grow long varieties which would have been impossible otherwise.

If you only have heavy soil to work with and no option to loosen it, just plant varieties which can handle it. Oxheart is one, short and very wide. Used to be very popular for commercial canning around here. Starting to make a comeback now for gardeners.

Martin

[bower]

[mention]Paquebot[/mention] I do remember your thread about growing super carrots in containers.

Now I wish I had done that, because my thick rows of seedlings are... gone! Yes there are a few dense patches yet, that the MOWER BEAST hasn't gotten to. Some critter is mowing my carrots down at the cotyledon stage, and distinctly prefers carrots over weeds. Not the pill bugs, there aren't enough of them around. No tracks or animal sign that I could see.
I've seen a few big black slugs around the garden, wonder if that could be it.

Found it: Black Arion. Fond of seedlings eh.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_slug

[Paquebot]

Bower, one thing that will take carrot tops is a groundhog. If you have any of those around, that;s your culprit. Rabbits only eat them in cartoons!

Now is time to start looking for some pots for next year. Look for at least 15" depth even if you are only going to grow 6" to 8" Nantes. No weeding and self-thinning . Combine the information in this thread and my previous one and you will have more carrots than you can imagine. If the pot is wide enough, you could have one solid mass of carrots a foot wide. Like I have said, they will eat the organic medium. This all also applies to parsnips.

Martin

[ponyexpress]

I can't get over this idea of "carrots eating the growing medium". I guess I'll have to give this a shot. Any tips on parsnips?

I do have some large pots so I'll put it on the to-do list to get them going.

[ponyexpress]

Now is time to start looking for some pots for next year. Look for at least 15" depth even if you are only going to grow 6" to 8" Nantes. No weeding and self-thinning .

I have some grow bags that I think I will start using again for these carrots. My plan is to load them up with compost but the top 3" will be seed starting soil. The idea is that I won't have any weeds germinating. Is 3" sufficient or perhaps 2" ? Trying to conserve the good stuff.

[Paquebot]

Grow bags should also work. As with deep pots, it allows you to supply nutrients much deeper than normal garden tilling. And it would be OK if the top few inches were an inert medium. Feeder roots don't form until about 6" down. That's normal depth for many tillers. Getting the nutrient down to where the plants can find them means a little extra work. That's why carrots do so well in containers where one can amend the deeper strata.

Martin

[ponyexpress]

I filled one bag during my lunch break. I have a pile of dirt that I removed from around my new deck that was built a couple of years ago. I think it will be a perfect medium for carrots/parsnips as it's a mix of sand/dirt. I sifted it with my hands but for the next two bags, I'll use the mesh screen.

[LK2020]

Don't know if I've told the hot tip here or not, pots! Pots 15" to 18" for 10" to 12" like Candysnax and Sugarsnax. Then use well-aged horse manure for a medium. Sow as thick as in the ground and don't worry about thinning. They will self-thin and grow into an almost solid mass of full-sized carrots.

This year, 6 pots with 4 being long and two early short ones. The long ones Baltimore, Candysnax, Rainbow, and Sugarsnax. The shorties are Adelaide and Short And Sweet. Last year there were Sugarsnax which went down 12" and made a 90º turn for another 3: or 4". The pots are set several inches into the soil so the tap roots follow the water through the drainage holes.

My standard pots are 7-gallon with several 10s for the "snax". They start out full to the top with pure old manure. By old, it is black to no longer be recognizable for what it is. If I start with 10 gallons there may be only 5 or 6 left after the carrots are removed. They eat it! This year I could not get the super-aged manure so mixed 50/50 with last year's and newer "brown" manure. A bit high in nitrogen resulting in huge foliage and a few doubles so far in the Adelaide.

Martin

I would love to try that. Where do you get your old horse manure?

[Paquebot]

Horse manure is available wherever there are horses! Usually lots of it. Disposal is often a problem. I have gotten it from 7 different sources. Several have actual large bins just for it. The one with real old stuff is a proper bin and there used to be a sign saying free manure. Liked that place as they used sand in the stables instead of straw. (Straw is where 90% of the weeds come from.) Problem was that it is about 15 miles away. When deep into that pile, the material looks just like silt.

Present source is only about 3 miles away but too close to a large city and turnover is quick. Pile is mixed now and then with an end loaded so it's a combination of old and new. Sawdust is used in the stables there so only weed is clover from the hay. The pile does heat from the periodic turning and that also eliminates most weeds. Since that still has a lot of fresh material in it, I mix it 50/50 with the previous year's material. I took a count the other night as to how may 7-gallon and bigger pots I had and it was 55. A friend said that that must have taken a lot of manure. It did, 21 5-gallon pails the first trip and 24 the next. (F-150 pickup.)

If you aren't keen on driving through the countryside and looking for horses, try Craig's List in early spring. That's when the winter's accumulation needs to be moved and easier to let someone else do it. You might find some suggesting to bring a truck and they will load it. I have a friend who boards over 30 horses on her farm. No problem if you want 10 gallons or10 yards!

There is one thing with carrots and that is to stay away from too much fresh manure. It will often result in forked or palmated roots. I've seldom seen it in pots due to everything being forced to grow straight down and no room for hanky panky. It's from excess nitrogen.

Martin

[Paquebot]

Whoever thought that growing carrots could be so complicated? I live in an area where almost every town had a canning company at one time. Corn and peas here with beets and carrots in next town. I have seen grain trucks full of both on their way to the cannery. One time I was coon hunting in the 1960s and dog took off across a large flat field. A few yards into it was like walking in deep snow. It was a peat field and the crop just harvested was carrots. Learned something that night and enjoyed long carrots ever since. Never ever planted a carrot seed without prepping at least a foot deep ever since.

With tales out of the way, back to growing what is advertised as potential. Garden option is to make a bed over a foot deep if conventional. Applies to those 90% who do not have deep sandy loam. I'll stay with container advice. If you don't have access to old horse manure, composted stuff at garden centers are a start. I can get broken bags from local garden center for almost free but never have found one that doesn't need more help. Always too heavy which means soil was used in the composting process. That in turn means sand must be used to loosen what should not need anything. Can't beat the system so don't try! Grow bags call for a certain medium and work but not the best. Just ain't right for a root crop. First need is a container at least 6" deeper than mature potential. Might mean "tree pots" which may be 18" deep. Only then can you control everything from germination to harvest.

Formula for 10-gallon pot, buying or scrounging: 8 gallons old manure, composted or otherwise, cow or horse, and 2 gallons of sand. You WILL get carrots!

Martin

[ponyexpress]

I have some carrots that I planted back in May/June. I was thinning out some carrots in a row that was too full. So I ate a couple and found them to be a little bitter. Is that because of the hot weather we've been having? If I leave them alone, will they get sweeter? Can you leave a carrot planted in May to grow until frost? Or will it be too woody?

[Paquebot]

Pony, your little ones are an example of what I say about self-thinning. The biggest ones get all of the nutrients and staarve the little one. Without the nutrients they can not develop their normal sugary taste. If allowed to mature, and it's a variety that is normally sweet, genetics are such that the sweetness would show up later.

Martin

[bower]

That is good to know. I tried a few thinnings the other day and they were bitter too. I thought hot dry weather may have ruined them all, but there's hope!

[loulac]

Whoever thought that growing carrots could be so complicated?Martin

Experience has taught me not to insist when a variety stubbornly refuses to grow in my place, I test a different one. I've settled on the Colmar variety, very hardy, I don't know if it can be found in the States.

I water the seeded bed and cover it with old burlap bags I keep wet for about a week, I have to take them out as soon as growth begins. I can use ferns as well , they let enough light reach young plants while keeping the soil damp.

Up to now nobody complained here about carrot flies. In my garden they lay eggs on the leaves in July and the larvae crawl down into the roots. I have to raise a net to make a tunnel over the carrot bed to protect them.

[bower]

Great advice about varieties, I think there are enough ferns around here to try that too!
We gave up growing carrots at my Dad's place due to the terrible rust fly, although we finally beat them in his last summer. His plan was to wait, and plant just after the fly season in July. I prepped the bed removing all rocks to a depth of a foot. Then waited until he told me when it was time to plant. IDK how he figured that but he was probably observing the flies on their host weeds in the area. I planted as instructed. There was a beautiful crop of carrots late in the fall, with no rust fly damage although we didn't even try protecting them.
Here in the woods I have not had any rust fly damage on the carrots I've managed to get. There's no wild carrot in the immediate area. I do use row cover to protect the seedlings but I am not covering them the whole season, as they have to do at my friend's farm. If I see rust fly, I would change that and do as you do, make a proper tunnel with netting they can't get into or row cover all season. At the farm we have to do rotation as well pretty strictly, because the fly larvae can be in the soil and emerge inside the cover, afaik.

[GoDawgs]

Experience has taught me not to insist when a variety stubbornly refuses to grow in my place, I test a different one. I've settled on the Colmar variety, very hardy, I don't know if it can be found in the States.

That Colmar name rang a bell so I went back in my records. Yes, I grew Giants Of Colmar in Fall '11. The seed came from Territorial Seed and yes, they still sell it.

[GoDawgs]

I have some carrots that I planted back in May/June. I was thinning out some carrots in a row that was too full. So I ate a couple and found them to be a little bitter. Is that because of the hot weather we've been having? If I leave them alone, will they get sweeter? Can you leave a carrot planted in May to grow until frost? Or will it be too woody?

The spring carrots I planted came up mid March, they're still not all harvested (I planted way too many!) and they taste just fine. We've had all this terrible heat but it hasn't affected the carrots. I discovered they really like some shade during the day. These get shade until about noon or 1PM and then full sun until maybe 7pm. They are also heavily mulched with old leaves so the soil stays relatively cool.

Varieties planted were Bolero, Envy, Yaya and Romance. I'm dropping the Envy next spring. Nice tasting carrot but weak tops that break off when carrots are pulled. BTW, a tip I read about pulling carrots works really well. Grab the top right where it attaches to the carrot, push down and then it usually pulls out easily. Sometimes it doesn't work on Envy.

[Paquebot]

Envy would be a good candidate fore deep pots. At 12" length, it is not suited to grow in normal garden soil. It would require very deep tilling. That long length is why it won't pull easy. Too many anchors.

Martin