Carrots - Grow Your Own Wants Your Advice!

[Snadger]

I like nantes, so I grow them in a mix of last seasons growbags(75%) and sharp sand(25%) in halved blue plastic water butts and stick a clove of garlic in the middle. Never seen a carrot fly !As for the height CF fly off the ground, they've been found over wintering in the tops of trees about 30 feet off the ground.

Jeesh!! If thats right, I'll just have to build a 35 foot high raised bed!

[Protea]

I grew carrot fly resistant variety 'flyaway' last year, and got a reasonable crop considering the drought, there were quite a few split roots and they were a bit wonky - but then my lottie is nasty Bedfordshire clay and it used to be a gravel pit - so you can imagine the stones

I like the idea of digging out a trench and filling in with used potting compost - i have loads of that! and also the plank of wood over the seed to prevent the weeds....i always end up with terribly weedy carrot crops.

Next year i'm still planing on growing Flyaway but i've also got some early Nantes so we'll see how that goes, it sounds promising based on other replies here. I never used my enviromesh i bought last year, so perhaps i shall get it out of the packet to protect these ones!

[dwrudd]

I just love the taste of early Nantes and so have stuck with them for a while now.

I have grown french Marigold alongside them to confuse the carrot fly and this does work but you must plant the rows of Marigold a good 12 to14 inches from the carrots, they bush up so much that it can stifle the light to the carrots and stop them growing.

But my favourite way of stopping the fly attack is to use grow bags but on their side!

I have found that if you start with a plank of wood on its edge and secured with a couple of pegs knocked into the floor, you can stand growbags up against it and finish it of with another plank to form a sort of sandwich. Then cut open the edges of the bags and plant your seed along the top. Being higher up than the surrounding ground seems to stop the fly attack. Also the compost is so soft the carrots form lovely, large straight roots that taste fabulous.

Harvesting is also easy, slide a bag out, empty the compost and pick'em up

Cheers all
Darren

[rustylady]

Carrots...I garden in Suffolk, proper carrot-crunchin-country! Have had no problem with carrot fly since I started growing them under net curtains (actually, voile is what you want...about £1 a metre from net curtain shops. White voile to let in the sunlight). 2005 I cropped some lovely Purple Dragons (purple on the outside, orange on the inside) and Paris Market (round ones). 2006 was absolutely terrible...several sowings of 100s of seeds at different intervals...cropped about 6 carrots all year.

[kittykat8]

like the idea of grow bags how do you stop them getting water logged do you put holes in the bottom.

marion

[Snadger]

Carrots...I garden in Suffolk, proper carrot-crunchin-country! Have had no problem with carrot fly since I started growing them under net curtains (actually, voile is what you want...about £1 a metre from net curtain shops. White voile to let in the sunlight). 2005 I cropped some lovely Purple Dragons (purple on the outside, orange on the inside) and Paris Market (round ones). 2006 was absolutely terrible...several sowings of 100s of seeds at different intervals...cropped about 6 carrots all year.

How long does voile last then rustylady? Can you get more than one season out of it? Might be cheaper and do the same job as enviromesh!

[dwrudd]

Yes, it is easy whilst they are on their side, just a few stabs of the plastic and hey presto, I like to try the oddball methods sometimes. You get great results and learn all the time.

Darren

[Elmo]

I grew Purple dragon in drain pipes this year following a complete flop last year. I managed to get hold of a big plastic pipe about 6 inches across I cut it up into 2ft sections pushed it into the soil a little and filled it with compost. The seeds were sown on top and watered regularly. They were a hugh sucess no carrot fly as they fly close to the ground this clearly baffles them and the corrots were long and straight.

[Tomas]

Carrots. I start my Carrots in the Greenhouse in newspaper pots, I make the pots by wrapping the newspaper around the toilet roll cardboard. Make it about two inches high,(you dont need a bottom to the pot the roots will bind the compost together) You just staple the newspaper pot together with two staples. When you think they are big enough I plant them in my 4ft by 4ft raised bed. No thinning needed.the newspaper rots down in a couple of weeks providing you cover the newspaper with soil.I also cover mine with a wooden frame and enviromesh. I feed once with chicken pellets soaked in the watering can overnight. try putting the pellets in an old 'foot' from an old pair of 'tights'. Good Luck.


Tomas.