Has anyone given up on carrots?

[davaroo]

I can get greatly improved carrot germination by either buying and sowing pelleted seed or by using cornstarch gel.

One tablespoon cornstarch to one cup of boiling water makes the gel. Then I pour a line of the gel and sprinkle seed sparingly on it. It seems to work as well as the pelleted seed.

Both approaches have the same principle at work - holding moisture for a slow germinating seed. Carrot seed can take 3 weeks to come up in my garden. During all that time, they are about one-quarter of an inch down in very porous ground. Sunshine comes and goes and a couple times a week, I get some water on that soil surface. Not doing something to keep that quarter inch moist usually dooms the carrot seed.

Some have good success placing a board or burlap over the soil surface (DrakeMaiden). If I do that, I forget to look to see if there are any seedlings coming up .

Steve

Very cool idea on the gel, Steve. Have you used that universally for your seed planting?

 

[digitS']

Dave, I tried the gel with lettuce and it worked fine there but, despite looking much the same, lettuce seed is a lot different than carrot. It shoots up almost in a matter of hours even in very cold soil. So, why was I adding extra "stuff" to hold moisture around the seed . . . ?

What I found with the gel was that I usually didn't make enuf of it. A cup doesn't go far, at all. Two cups gets me started. I usually end up with over 100 sq.ft. of carrot bed. That would probably take a couple of quarts to do the entire thing all at once. Of course, cornstarch is cheap and the process is simple.

. . . the green tops were ripped off but nothing dug them up yet. Any idea what might have done that?

Marmots, the western mountain version of groundhogs, eat carrots the same way. I suspect that Bugs Bunny would too if he wasn't an animation. Rabbits :bun
in my garden are usually too busy eating my beans and peas to take time with carrots.

Steve

 

[davaroo]

I got an advert from Heritage Seed, promoting "baby" veggies for fall and winter gardening. This one:

http://www.territorialseed.com/product/11074/325

The Adelaide is 10% off.