Sowing "Salad" Carrots

Latest post from MARKSVEGPLOT – a blog about food and gardening in England”

Until last year, when the effective use of Enviromesh made such a dramatic difference to my success with growing Carrots, I had tended to stick to growing only baby Carrots (aka Finger Carrots or Salad Carrots) – ones which are quicker-growing than Maincrop ones, and ones which being small are easier to protect. For several years now I have grown this type of Carrot in plastic crates positioned inside a raised wooden planter outside our kitchen window.

This year I am going to grow Maincrop Carrots in my new extra-deep raised bed, but I’m still going to grow the Salad Carrots too. I have chosen 3 varieties:

They are “Chantenay Red Cored 2″, a short almost triangular-shaped variety; “Amsterdam Forcing 3″, a longer, slim one; and “Paris Market 5″, a short fat stump variety.

The stump varieties are supposedly particularly suited to growing in pots and containers, because they do not require any great depth of soil. I have not tried this type before, so it will be an interesting experiment for me. My instinct tells me that my little granddaughters will like them!

I sowed my Carrot seeds at the weekend.

There isn’t much to see at present, but let me tell you that one crate is devoted entirely to Chantenay, and the other crate has half each of the other two varieties. I used ordinary multi-purpose compost (New Horizon peat-free), at a depth of about 20cm. The seeds were sprinkled onto the surface of moist compost and then covered with a thin layer of dry compost. The crates then went into the wooden planter and are now covered with a piece of Enviromesh weighted down with bricks.

When the seeds germinate I will put in some wire hoops to raise the Enviromesh well above the Carrots, to allow the foliage to grow without being restricted. All I have to do now is wait…

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