Hi all, :D, just wanted to tell you that I pulled up the first of my carrots today, ;D They are straight & true with no signs of carrot fly problems. Other people on the lottie say it can be a problem there. I used scirroco from dobies, they say they are resistant to carrot fly & i guess they are right. They were sown on the 25th April.
Adrian.
Yum yum! I wish I could grow carrots - my soil is like potter's clay though :-\
Ten x
Tenuse, I grow Parmex, they're round(ish) -still taste like real carrots though we had some last night.
Jeremy
Congratulations Adrian, That is fantastic! My greatest challenge has been to grow carrots, which seem so difficult to chit and grow to fruitition, thanks to the dratted carrot fly.
Gave up hope last year, but this year after about three attempts have managed to get some up. My husband is growing his in between his onions as carrot fly don't seem to like them.
Thanks for the advice on the variety of seed you are using - which is worth bearing in mind for next season. :) busy_lizzie
I use both Nantes for the short and St Valery for long carrots, i cant grow them in the soil at the allotment but i do grow them in the greenhouse and have no bother with the carrot fly.
Peter
round carrots! Now there's a thought......
Ten x
Wahay! Good for you Adrian!! Never had probs growing carrots in the garden, but boy am I having trouble on the allotment! Just won't germinate - don't know if it is naff seed or the birds or the ground, but finally I have 6 rows, although they are real patchy! Will infill with radishes I think!
Our site secretary has given up growing her own carrots as she doesn't think they are any better than shop bought! :o Personally, I don't think you can beat a crunchy earthy carrot, straight from the ground and into your gob at 8am in the morning! (closely followed by a radish, raspberry, rocket flowers and an alpine strawb! Breakfast doesn't get any better than that!) :P
Is it too late to plant the round type in a greenhouse now ?
Peter
Nothing like fresh juicy carrots! Our soil was pretty heavy/clay but we dig sand in where we grow the carrots, this is their third year in those beds so next year it will be change position or else dig in a few bags of top soil to refresh I think. Lovely carrots this year, no carrot fly as kept covered from sowing to harvest - our site seems to get a lot of the dreaded fly if we don't.
I intersowed my carrots with leeks, onions & parsnips just to confuse that dratted fly as the other lottie holders had advised me that the fly was a keen visitor to the area. So far everything in the bed is coming along a treat.
However just in case the lottie crop got destroyed or attacked I sowed some short stumped carrots in an old tin bath ifilled with a bag of bog-standard compost in my back yard & they're doing absolutely excellant.
Can't wait to see what either crop tastes like
cc
Got a tip from one of our lottie members. He sows his carrots in a couple of old plastic dustbins. Fills them up every year with fresh soil, can move them around his plot and they are nearly three feet from the ground, so no carrot fly problems. He has just passed this tip onto me, and says he has never failed. Saw them at his plot and what good looking carrots he had. :D busy_lizzie
We had the carrot for Dinner today.
Yeah some things work on the plot and other are much better in a tub at home, carrots and spring onions and raddishes are perfect at home in tubs,standard potting compo or stuff from the bin that I sieved, perfect.crispy crunchy carrots and perfect round golf ball raddishes with not a blemish.
My lottie neighbour grows his carrots in mounds of soil. We have heavy clay and he just makes rows of mounds and sows on the top of the mound and he has wonderful straight carrots, lots of them and no carrot fly.
I cover mine with fleece from start to finish,no probs with fly at all......Alan
Not your actual exhibition stuff, but a first try with a raised bed.
Lesson for next year - WATER the things! But they seem to have enjoyed it, nevertheless. = Tim
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Tim your raised bed doesn't look very big, roughly what are the dimensions? Thinking about growing carrots next year because there's a friendly donkey on the way to and from my daughters nursery school and we have to give the donkey two carrots on each of the three days a week that we walk to nursery, it would be great for Jessica to pull a carrot from the garden herself, perhaps I could actually get her to have one too rather than feeding them all to the donkey. Can anyone recommend a dead easy variety to grow, something that will withstand a little neglect and mature quickly.
"something that will withstand a little neglect and mature quickly"
now that's the kind of children you want, let alone carrots!
Size? 4'x4'. 7 rows of carrots - quite a lot of carrots?
Quick? Can't do better than Amsterdam Forcing or Early Nantes. = Tim
Mine are in an old safeways tub about 2x1` with bin liner in it,loads of great crunchy carrots.
Trying to get picture on here? ???
Look great Tim. Delish.
I have been pleased with my lastest attempt at growing carrots, having failed in the past.
Not hat many though, having been grown in tubes then planted out. However they are growing well, though a little over shadowed by the tomatoes they are growing next to.
I am now considering a direct sowing in a larger quantity. How late can you sow carrots? I am thinking perhaps a late sowing in august once the early spuds are lifted?
I have just sowed a couple of rows for baby roots for christmas...can't remember the variety tho. Got them from Marshalls.
I grew Nantes, and many of them branched, I think cos I started them at home, then transplanted them. They taste great though...strangely the ones I planted straight out a few weeks ago havent come up at all....not a sausage...v disappointing. :'(
This year I grew Early Nantes in a cardboard box filled with growbag compost. Occasional feed with chicken manure and tomato feed. Sown really thickly so I just pull a handful out at a time. Taste good and no carrot fly. Unlike the crop sown in the soil.
August Richard?
I have sown in July and had 'reasonable sized' carrots by October.
Nothing ventured . . . eh?
That is odd mystic, yours not coming up. All of my rows have been a bit hit or miss, lots of gaps, but then I have only had seed that was a year or 2 old, or was given to me in swaps. The carrots I have just sowed for winter picking were brand new from Marshalls. I sowed them thick becuase of all my previous failures, and they are up like cress! Zillions of them!!! I am going to have to do some serious thinning. The moral of this tale, Emma will try to buy new seed and use it all up rather than hang on to seed for yonks.
While into carrots, some folk complain about sowing them thinly.
Why the problem?? Just tip a few into your palm, moisten the tip of your (for me, middle) finger, lightly touch a seed & flick it into its space. Seriously, no need for thinning. = Tim
I think I might just go for it and see what happens. Our autumns and early winters are prety mild here so should get some decent growth before it gets too cold.
Thinking of doing the same with salad leaves (letuce etc) for the same reason.