Parsnips!

[Cranford Steve]

Any tips on growing parsnips, when to plant, to pre germinate or not, plant in greenhouse first, the usual, every bloody thing! lol

[Shadylane]

Did you really just go there?
Surely it's too early to mention the P word, I mean we're not even in December yet.

Everyone has their own method for sowing these little darlings, but it doesn't have to be complicated. I think the trick is patience and to keep them moist. If you plant too early, they say they can fail, though my first year I sowed Feb/March and had loads. The following year I sowed later and a lot failed. Trouble with sowing in April is it tends to be dry these days whereas Feb/March is much wetter but colder.

Plant direct in soil you've loosened and removed stones from. Water the drill ie so they're sitting on wet soil, then if you cover with compost that will help keep em moist.

Prepare for a million and one responses and some mild swearing.

[singleseeder]

Water the drill, sow seed at 4" stations, (I'm not called Singleseeder for nothing) cover seeds with soil and then lay a plank of wood over the drill. Leave well alone for two weeks then lift the plank. You will have lots of little seedlings just waiting for the light.

I had 99% germination

[Florence Fennel]

Treat yourself Steve! I dare you to do a search on here with the word PARSNIP, it'll keep you occupied for days

[SlugLobber]

lol at FF! I've never had a parsnip failure, but I think I've been lucky from the sounds of things! I favour the windowsill in Feb method. They do take a while to germinate. I've done both soil alone and in toilet rolls to ease transplantation. Both worked for me.

[Fruit&2veg]

Personaly. the only time i have had poor germination has been through sowing too early in cold wet soil. These days, I find the middle of march plenty early enough, but soon as the soil is workable to a fine tilth with plenty of depth after this. Most losses are due to seed lying around in cold wet conditions and rotting. Keep soil moist and you should have no problems.
My Parsnips are always a little on the large side, and as a mainly winter veg they have a long growing season so delaying sowing by a week or two has little effect,
I do like the sound of Singleseeders idea of covering the row with a plank to keep moist, Might give this a try myself on a short row just for comparison this coming year.

[j r hilton]

I always put mine in the airing cupboard on damp paper until they germinate and then sow only germinated seeds. Never have any failures this way.

[binley100]

Feel the need to add my two pennyworth as well.........I wait till April , use a bulb planter to remove a plug of soil as deep as I can about every 8 inches. Fill with compost and water well . Let soak in then sow 3 seeds at every plug and cover with a little more compost . Then wait patiently . And , all though its not the done thing , have been known to very carefully transplant small seedlings by dibbing a hole and dropping them in as straight as I can .

[vegnut]

I agree with Fruit&2veg.
The only thing i do differently is to use old pot compost to cover the seeds, so that i don't get capping. That and early sowing is my main failure window.

[Victoria26]

Chit on damp kitchen roll. Plant 1 viable seed per loo roll and straight into the ground after a week or so and forget about them. My snips are always monsters, I find them super easy to grow and end up supplying half my lottie friends after their epic failures! hahaha

[Florence Fennel]

Well known British traits are talking about the weather, sarcasm, an ability to queue, keeping a stiff upper lip, an overriding interest in class and a love of tea. This list should also now include an ability to discuss the germination and cultivation of PARSNIPS!

[darkbrowneggs]

I sow direct, but try to allow the soil time to warm up a bit first. The I sow around 3 to a station with a thin sprinkling of radish seed between. The radish germinate quickly and act as a marker, by the time they are ready to eat the parsnips are geneally though and you can see what you are doing.

[nellie-m]

I found an interesting article on this:

Germinate Parsnips successfully from the National Vegetable Society NVS

I sowed parsnip seeds during a short mild spell in January this year. What's more - these seeds were three years old, honestly. Not long after, temperatures dropped again to deep freezer conditions (remember I live on the continent) and stayed like this for quite some time. My Leicester friend had a good laugh at my gardening skills and sent me some more parsnip seeds because she said the chances mine would grow were also way below zero!
I didn't get around to sowing a second time, but sure enough there's a lovely row of parsnips in my garden now...
Plus I let three lovely ones from last year live and thrive to save seeds, and as I couldn't get the seedheads off without seeds jumping all over the place I guess parsnips are going to be my weeds next year

[Gearoid]

I direct sowed mine quite late, in May I think and they germinated very well. I've had a quick look at them and moved a bit of soil and they look big and plump. I'm just waiting for a nice bit of frost to sweeten them up for xmas dinner!