Topic: newbie - OK to sow carrots now?

[VeggieMan]

Hi everyone,

I've just taken on a plot (30ft x 45ft) and have been busy clearing it all up, and I'm very much a newbie, so a big learning curve for me!

I've looked at a few books and some other websites, and I have to say this is the best I've found so far!

I've planted early potatoes so far, and I was thinking of sowing the carrots this weekend (under cover of some kind, perhaps enviromesh or cloche?, to protect against carrot flies), but reading information from books it advises to sow either in early March or in June to avoid the carrot fly season. The variety of carrot is Autumn King (from The Kitchen Garden magazine!)
What do you all think? I don't expect to do really well this year as I am very much experimenting at the moment but would like to have some success with it! Should I wait or go ahead with it?

My 4 year old has been 'helping' me and I don't disappoint him too much!!

Dan

[jammyd]

Hi Dan, I sowed my first row of carrots last weekend between a few lines of onion sets - most books will say now is an okay time to sow.
As for children helping you, I've found that my son is even more impatient than me, and seeds are no good for him. He prefers to plant a "plant" and then watch it grow and fruit. He was master of courgettes last year and they are a satisfying, fast growing crop which kept him busy!

Good luck with it all, Dan!

jammyd

[Dunc_n_Tricia]

This Sunday will be the first anniversary of us getting our allotment - cause for celebration!!!

So it is about this time of year that I sowed a bed of parsnips and carrots (about 2 weeks after we got the plot). I put in Autumn King and Early Nantes. I had read that carrot fly only find carrots by smell when you thin them out - the bruised flesh of the thinnings being what attracts them. So I put one seed every 2cm or so and left them to it.

The Autumn King were quite a success - rather large and very tasty. Didn't see much of the Early Nantes - rather a disappointment.

This was on a site where I had been told by the friendly chaps that NOBODY grew carrots on their site in open ground because of an infestation of carrot fly! They all have raised boxes which they grow their carrots in since the carrot fly are only supposed to fly 18" above the ground.

You should have seen the looks on their faces when they saw our carrots! I didn't know our allotment Chairman knew names like he called me!?! Needless to say I'll be planting some more soon, but am going for Flyaway and Resistafly just to be on the safe side.

So if you are going to sow them now, I recommend sowing them at reasonable spacings and not to thin out.

 :-* Tricia

[Mrs Ava]

I have a couple of rows in under fleece.  I plan to leave the fleece in situ for the whole growing season (someone will now say, no EJ, do it like this) but that is what Monty advised on GW a couple of weeks back.  I have never had a problem with fly, so I am sure there will be other rows with no protection.  I have asked about on our site, and nobody there does anything to protect them, so maybe it isn't such a problem with ours.....mind you, there is always a first time.

[Wicker]

Carrots from the lottie are sim[ply the best we love them but despite trying powders and sympathetic planting alongside we still got carrot fly badly for a couple of years.  
Tried EJs way with fleece and it was great as well as easy and simple. But my husband (typical man!!) decided to build a frame and we roll environet over it and more or less leave it like that just lifting catrefully when planting later crops and it has worked a treat - no sign of THE FLY for a few years.  The net seemed expensive but it is simply rolled back and fore over the frame on a heavy piece of wood and has been like that for about four years summer and winter

Hope I don't have to eat my words instead of carrots this year!!!  Good luck.

[The gardener]

Being a typical man I did this  ;D





ps the gap on the end has been 'staged' to see under the cover!

[gavin]

Don't ask me!  My performance on carrots has been unmitigated disaster - over five years.  :) :) :)

I beleive "Autmun King" is particularly attractive to carrot-fly, so (for your 4-year-old's sake) I'd be tempted to get another variety to sow under fleece?

All best - Gavin

[kenkew]

Carrots and onion row by row,
Is really the only way to grow,
Sweetness better than you can buy,
And no more the onion and carrot fly.

[gavin]

Aye, you're a lucky man, Kenkew, if that worked for you.  Depends a lot on what "your" pests are, I suspect.  

Me?  I have seen neither onion fly nor, sadly, carrots.  Even at the recommended 4 rows onions to 1 row carrots - no carrots!

Ah well - note to self; try again this year!

All best - Gavin

[VeggieMan]

Wow!   :D

Many thanks for all your replies, though many of you have different methods!
I think I'll just try my luck this year and see what happens! With a bit of pot luck, hopefully I'll have some success!

Many thanks again

Dan

[Garden Manager]

Carrot fly have never been a problem for me - i have never managed to grow them well enough to gett attacked by them!!  :o

[ALAN HOWELL]

I use the fleece all season method for carrots with great success.My lottie soil caps over very easily after rain and sun ,hindering germination ,so I take out the drill as normal,sow the seed then fill the drill with m/p compost,this seems to cure the problem......Alan  g