Grow Your Own Magazine

My Carrots and Parships did not grow well this year.

The tips looked very healthy, but the roots did not grow down into the soil. So I was left will well formed stumpy produce.

Any ideas where I went wrong.

Asuming they weren't stumpy varieties of each, a possibility is a shallow topsoil or a panned sub soil.
Both carrots and parsnips like a deep sandy soil. The addition of loads of sand to next years carrot bed along with double digging or 'Bastard' digging (you'll soon find out why it's called this!!) should give an improvement methinks!
You could try growing a few in plastic pipes to get the depth. 4" pipes work well, 4 foot long filled with sand. Put a crowbar down the middle of the sand and work the top around to give a conical shape. Fill the hole with potting compost and sow three seeds in top, thin out to eave one plant per pipe. Apart from regular watering, they shouldn't need any more attention!

Hope this helps!

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My soil is fine my carrots & parsnips did well but my swede, awful they were the same last year. The "old boys" on the allotment site say that swede never do well?
Any suggestions what the problem is?

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W. C. Fields

I dug over the site last year and added plenty of rotted farmyard manure, everything else thrives, and my Swedes look like Parsnips.

Could it be that its too fertile on the top ?

Never heard of this. Freshly manured ground can make parsnips canker. Maybe the ground was too wet and the roots didn't go deep to look for water

Hi Irish Digger,

I am pretty new in growing carrots ( and radishes) too. According to my gardening book, some of the reasons that the root don't form/ swell well are: too much nitrogen ( they will put a lot of leaves instead of root ), the other reason could be stunted ( due to ph issue, the compact ground, too wet or even too dry or any other soil conditions combinations ). Yes, it is not much help... sorry !
Hopefully the more experience grapes will be along soon.

Momol

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