Sometimes enthusiastic gardeners can get a little too carried away. Have you ever been guilty of killing your plants with kindness? Well, that’s something that happens quite regularly when growing root crops.
Root crops are veggies like carrots, beetroot, parsnip and onions.
They’re a particularly fussy mob, these root crops. They need the right type of soil and the right type of fertiliser and the right amount of water!
So what can go wrong? Have a look at this parsnip as an example.
(Yes, it’s one that came out of my garden – Guilty! I confess, I grew it!)
Instead of a nice long tapered root, it’s grown several off-shoots. It’s bent and twirling around itself. Maybe this has happened to your crop too. It can happen to any tapered root crops including carrots.
The real problem lies in the soil. The soil my parsnips grew in was way too fertile, I’ve been too heavy handed with the compost and manure. As I said … enthusiastic gardeners getting carried away!
Normally I would suggest that you cannot put too much fertiliser in your garden bed … except when it comes to root crops. A root crop needs to search out it’s nutrients deep in the soil, that’s why it tapers downwards. But my soil had nutrients available everywhere so the parsnip didn’t have to go looking.
Why would I make such a mistake? It’s very easily done when you have clay soil. To improve the texture and structure of the soil you need to add loads of organic material to transform it into a rich, crumbly soil that holds water for the plants yet also allows any excess water to drain away. It may take some time to improve the quality of your soil but it will happen eventually. So during this time, it’s advisable to delay planting root crops to avoid exactly this happening. Root crops cannot penetrate compacted clay soil so a sandy loam is preferred. Sandy loam is loose and easy to penetrate and leaches nutrients down through the soil, so a parsnip or carrot needs to work it’s way down to get it.
Too much nitrogen in the soil gives plenty of leaf growth at the expense of root growth. So avoid chicken manures if you’re planning on growing root crops.
The solution ….
Grow a crop through the bed first. It’s important to add as much organic material to your soil as you can to improve it, but grow other vegetables instead. Leaf and fruiting crops will soak up any excess nitrogen and fertility and then leave the soil ready for planting out root crops. This might be up to a year after you initially prepare your garden bed. So don’t skimp on the garden goodies, just delay your root crop for a year.
PS. The parsnip still tasted great … I made it into soup!
Happy gardening,
The Veggie Lady.
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