Bit of advice about carrots/beetroot please!

[chris]

Hello, here's my first proper post following on from the introduction post I just made. Complete novice at this, and would appreciate honesty - if I've done something completely wrong please do tell me ! My wife and I have just got the "bug" of growing things, and have grown a few different types of herbs well - and now have moved onto vegetables.

Anyways, I made a trough to grow some veg in (so I didn't have to dig our lawn up - resale reasons) - it's roughly I'd say 1.5m long, by say 0.5m wide, sits maybe 0.5m high up off the grown too. In it I filled it with some good quality compost, and mixed in a little of that bonemeal stuff to help with the seeds we sowed - probably not needed, not sure why I did it actually!

I planted half and half, carrots and beetroot directly from the seeds - and now the carrots have shoots about an inch high (these were planted maybe 3 weeks ago?), and beets have about 2inch shoots on them.. I'd initially planted the seeds in about 4 rows of each (4 rows of carrots, and 4 of beetroot) - as the packet said that some may not germinate so plant plenty - but eventually they'd need pricking out. As they were so bunched together (I guess every single seed germinated) I've today tried to space them out much more - have moved some of the bunches into pots and put them in our makeshift greenhouse (one of those metal framed things, with a plastic cover on). I've spaced them out, to have maybe 4 inches around them, give or take some - and left two groups of the shoots, incase these ones don't take. I've a picture of it here:



My question is - after hearing / reading bad things about pricking carrots out (is that the correct term?) - carrot fly and all that have I done the right thing? A friend of ours said once they were an inch high, space them out - he didn't and his carrots were tiny. I'm also not sure if it's too late for them to grown into decent sized carrots if they will at all?

Have I dont the wrong thing to beetroot too? Will these need spacing more out due to the bulbs growing?

Think that's it about them - but I've a few more about other veg that I'll post in a different thread to keep things separately.

Thanks in advance!

Chris

[squashysu]

hi chrismarks

when i first sowed my carrots & beets i did the same as you and just picked out the ones to give me a bit of space, i am sure they will be fine, i have just harvested lots of beetroot today and then pickled them and some were huge, i am about to sow some more carrots and then i am gonna put them in the greenhouse if i need so, i am sure you have done a great job and dont forget that you can use the carrot thinnings in salads as well as the leaves from the beetroot.

Happy growing

SS

[Demeter]

Don't know anything about carrot fly as I've never had it, but assuming you escape that the only danger from moving carrots about and disturbing their roots is that you might get funny shaped carrots. Makes them a bit harder to pull and prepare (especially if you're thinking of peeling them!) but otherwise they are still carrots.

I would think beetroot will be OK to move around.

Where did you get your seeds from? I wouldn't trust any packet that said you should sow "plenty" of seed. Most will say to sow thinly. I tried to sow what I thought was "thinly" the first time I grew anything apart from sunflowers from a seed (earlier this year) and I ended up with a jungle.... learned my lesson and am much less heavy handed now! If it says sow plenty then it sounds to me like the producer either wants you to waste your seed or has sold you some rubbish seeds!

Oh, and welcome to the vine!

[lynda66]

most of my carrots and beetroot are in a 1m x 1m patch, there are loads, the plan is to pull up the small carrots to thin them as they start growing orange bits, and eat them as baby veg, same with beetroot, they do push each other out of the way, so you can just thin as you go.

[Kristen]

I grow beetroot in 3" pots and plant them out at the optimal spacing. Whenever I try to sow them "thinly in a drill" I always wind up with some gaps, and some jungle [(c) Demeter ]. Not so easy with carrots and parsnips, and my soil is heavy so I don't have brill results with them anyway.

[chris]

Don't know anything about carrot fly as I've never had it, but assuming you escape that the only danger from moving carrots about and disturbing their roots is that you might get funny shaped carrots. Makes them a bit harder to pull and prepare (especially if you're thinking of peeling them!) but otherwise they are still carrots.

I would think beetroot will be OK to move around.

Where did you get your seeds from? I wouldn't trust any packet that said you should sow "plenty" of seed. Most will say to sow thinly. I tried to sow what I thought was "thinly" the first time I grew anything apart from sunflowers from a seed (earlier this year) and I ended up with a jungle.... learned my lesson and am much less heavy handed now! If it says sow plenty then it sounds to me like the producer either wants you to waste your seed or has sold you some rubbish seeds!

Oh, and welcome to the vine!

Hi,

Thanks for the reply (and the rest of you too!) - I think my wife got them from B&Q, but they weren't B&Q's 'own' brand of seeds. So when sowing thinly - how should I be doing it? Leave 2" between each seed, per row, and also between rows?

Thanks again

[MaureenHall]

I thought I'd try to be "clever" this year, and try harder to sow the carrots as thinly as possible but still have a decent crop. Anyway, I mixed up some wallpaper paste and added a good pinch of seeds. I put the mixture into a poly bag, cut off a little bit of a corner and used it like a piping bag to spread the mixture down the row. I've got a nice row of well spaced carrots, but I think they're a bit TOO well spaced, so next time I'll add more seed.

No doubt someone will tell me I'm being daft and irresponsible using the paste, but as it was covered over with soil, I don't think any critters will have been harmed. Might try it again next year with other types of seed.

Going to use an empty Splenda sweeteners container next year to plant/sow my parsnips I tried it in the kitchen the other day, and the principle seems ok. That might work for other biggish seeds as well

[Demeter]

So when sowing thinly - how should I be doing it? Leave 2" between each seed, per row, and also between rows?

Depends on the size of the seed (how easy it is to handle) and also the size of the spacing you want plants to grow at. If you are planning to move the seedlings once they are through then obviously you can grow them more closely than if you are sowing them where they are going to be growing to maturity.

One way of doing it is to sow at "stations". E.g., if you want to have one plant every 6 inches, you sow say 2-4 seeds every 6 inches then when they come through you thin as necessary, i.e. choose the strongest seedling at each station and remove the rest. This is good for large seeds like beans or peas and also for seeds where you don't want to have to move the seedlings about once they are through.

Another way of doing it is to sprinkle the seed very finely all along the row. This method is good for seeds that are too fine to handle individually, especially if they don't mind being moved about, because you can prick them out to the correct spacings once the seedlings are large enough to handle. With very small seeds, you can mix in a little sand to help make thin sowing easier. I tend to put a pinch of seed in my upturned palm, holding it in a cupped shape, and then tap the side of my hand as I move it steadily up the row. That way a few seeds fall off my hand onto the soil all along and you end up with a sensible number of reasonably-spaced seedlings. Then just remove any extras that come through so that you get the spacing you want.

These are just the methods I have tried and which seem to work for me. There are lots of other ways, and there are products you can buy to help - you can even buy "seed tape" which has seeds pre-sown at suitable intervals along the tape, you just lay it on the ground and cover it with the appropriate depth of soil. I've read about the wallpaper paste method before but never tried it myself.

Hope that helps a bit

[lynda66]

just a warning if you're being organic, wallpaper paste contains a fungicide, to stop it going mouldy on the walls ....... so will be ok if you're not being organic

[zazen999]

I usually sow by dropping pinches of seeds at intervals. As they grow they push each other apart anyway.

Of course, thats in addition to my other two methods which are scattering aimlessly, and dropping a packet on the soil which ends up with about 50 seedlings all together. They just get moved when they are big enough when this happens. i try not to do this with carrots though as they are the only ones that don't really take to being moved about.

[gojiberry]

As a general rule root veg should not be transplanted as they don't like their roots to be disturbed. However I have sucessfully transplanted all root veg in the past. Parsnips tend to be the hardest and usually end up stumpy but still usable.

Ian

[glut]

I'm a novice too, but am enjoying bumper crops of carrots and beetroot. To be honest I wasnt too precious about spacing and sowed the carrots in drills and then thinned when they started to push each other out of the way. I ate the first thinnings (about 3-4 inches long) and am now picking bigger 'thinnings' at 6 inches...still plenty to go. Beetroot I started in 2" pots then planted on with about 4" between (ish). I have probably done lots wrong, but I'm having too much fun to mind.

[smc999]

Your carrots look to be in exactly the same sort of trough that I have made for mine (except I painted mine dark brown). I usually pull the carrots and leave them inside for 20-30 mins before I remove the stalks, as I've heard that will improve the flavour and will also cut down on the changes of root fly getting a whiff.
Best of luck with the carrots. :-)