I haven't had much luck in my past attempts at growing carrots. The first year I think we had a grand total of 5 carrots. The next year it was about 10. I'm not sure if I just bought some old seeds and they didn't germinate well, or if I planted them too deep or didn't keep them watered enough in the beginning. This year I am hoping for a different outcome. I am also going to try succession planting with my carrot patch. According to the seed packet carrots only take 50-60 days until they can be harvested. Since there is no way we could eat an entire bed's worth of carrots in a short time I am hoping that spacing out their planting times gives us more of a continuous harvest throughout the season. I planted the first "row" of carrots around the first day of spring. Each "row" is about a foot wide and has a row of radishes planted down the middle of two rows of carrots to help mark where the carrots will be. (radishes grow alot faster than carrots).
marking out the rows
seeds planted and covered lightly with soil
straw mulch
covered over with a board
I mulched the row with straw of course, but then I also added a plank of wood over the top of that. Carrot seeds are tiny and are not planted very deep so I wanted to make sure that they wouldn't blow away in our wild spring wind storms. I've also read that keeping a plank of wood over them helps to keep enough moisture around the seeds so that they will germinate better. I just worry that they won't get enough light to germinate, but some people say that light is not as much of an issue as moisture for carrots.
I plan on planting a "row" every 2-3 weeks until the bed is filled in completely. I just hope that I can keep up with my plan as summer kicks into high gear with weeding and harvesting other crops.
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