Results of the Parsnip Experiment (Sort of....)

Back spring last year I experimented with sowing some parsnips in toilet roll tubes. The reason I did this was because of the erratic nature of parsnip seed germination and that I have tended to have rather poor results from sowing the seeds directly in the ground. Unfortunately, my experiment was rather compromised by the fact that the chickens scratched up most of my carefully cultivated seedlings. However, there were just a few remaining.

Last weekend, now that the ground has finally defrosted and I can get a spade into the ground, I dug up those few parsnips that had not been destroyed by our poultry vandals. This is what I found:

As you can see they are rather on the small side. It is difficult to draw any real conclusions from this as there were so few of them, but I know I did plant out the seedlings quite late. What I hadn’t realised is that despite the fact the seedlings had not grown much on top when I planted them out, they had developed quite a lot of root, so I think I should have transferred them into the veg plot rather sooner than I did. Also, I don’t think I watered them enough during the extended dry period that we had over the summer.

I am not sure how much difference these would have made, but I think I will try this method again this year. Except I haven’t been very good at saving up toilet roll tubes!!

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