Carrots
Ease of Growing [Scale 1-5] - 1 (Easy)
How Time Consuming
Once planted and growing away not much time needed at all limited watering required.
Recommended Varieties
- Organic ‘Early Nantes’ – heavy reliable early crop.
- Organic ‘Flyaway F1’ are carrot fly resistant.
- Organic ‘Autumn King’ – Maincrop carrot, large and flavoursome , good for storing.
- Organic ‘Bambino’ – baby carrots, small and slender deep orange, 2nd early or maincrop carrot.
- ‘Market Baron’ & ‘Parmex’ smaller varieties suitable for containers.
Home Grown Vs Supermarket
There is no comparison. Home grown carrots dug up and eaten straight from the garden will have a flavour so different you will never want to eat mass produced carrots again!
Best Sites and Soils
Carrots require an open, sunny site with fertile well-drained soil (preferable sandy). If you have heavy clay, stony or shallow soil carrots can be grown in containers to get around this problem. They are ideal for raised bed gardening as this provides them with a deep root run and good drainage.
When to sow
Early cultivars late winter (Feb / Mar) sown under cloches.
Main season cultivars from early April (once soil is warm) to early July.
Distance between rows - 15cm (6”) apart
Distance between plants - Sow thinly and 13mm (1/2”) deep, thinning later if needed to 5cm (2”) apart.
When to harvest
Between 12-16 weeks after sowing depending on variety.
Problems to look out for:
Carrotfly can destroy a crops of carrots. Put up a barrier of insect mesh to stop them getting access to your crop.
