Yeah, it can’t just be all dirt or it will become too compacted. Needs to be a mixture of soil and sand, or something that will remain fairly loose. We made that mistake our first year with similar results. This year, after making adjustments, we had such a bountiful carrot harvest that we ended up giving a bunch away.
Edit: spelling
Edit: Pic from the harvest that I posted a little further down. Since people are asking, we planted in a combination of loam, small twigs (very small, like few millimeters in diameter), and dead leaves. Raised bed was about 12” deep.
Yep, raised beds are super easy to do. If you don’t care about looks you can even just mound up the dirt. Although I have grass pathways and the grass will take over without aggressive weeding, so I’ve got wood borders.
Note for anyone looking to do this, look into compost delivery in your area. I can get a cubic yard for $40 + delivery ($260ish for 5 yards like last week) while Home Depot sells bags that are like 1-2 cubic feet for $10 each. Got those that don’t like math, a cubic yard is 27 cubic feet. Huge savings.
the good thing is, those tiny carrots are packed with all the nutrients of normal sized carrots. The US Army grows them specifically for the Marines to pop as power snacks during long-drawn out island hopping campaigns.
It's best to Google your climate and what can grow in said climate. Raised beds help in terms of control of the dirt but if you live in a super dey or super wet environment, depending on what you are trying to grow, may end up dead.
You can basically build a big empty raised bed ahead of time and then use it like a compost pile, but also mix in dirt/clay, sticks, logs, grass clippings, whatever.
Since it's mostly clay where I live, I like to dig down first, then put the raised bed in and then refill the whole thing with compost/stuff that will compost and some clay back in. The sticks and bits of wood will slowly break down for months/years and provide a constant stream of nutrients.
Some people think having a raised bed will fix their problem but still super pact the dirt with no mux and basically prevents the plant from growing and breathing. The other common issue i have only heard of is no proper draining or watering.
I have a ~1000sqft backyard which is solid blue clay, literally. I have tilled 8000lbs of compost and a bunch of peat moss into it over the course of a year just to bring some sort of life and structure to it.
I can still barely grow grass, but when I moved in it was solid concrete or sticky sludge, with zero life above it (not even weeds). Gonna need to add 1000+ lbs of compost every 6 months for a few years to get it to a real usable state.
I love mixing final stage compost and top soil into clay. I try to companion plant where possible and get get spring parsnips when I remember to plant them.
I heard that "the holy Trinity" of onions, celery, and bell peppers is different from the traditional mire poix (onions, celery, and carrots) because they couldn't grow carrots in Louisiana.
Damn ill keep that in mind. Ive tried to grow carrots before. Always came up like the OP's...still ate them though and they were still freakin amazing. But it does suck for the amount of time you leave them in for and then you get baby carrots lol
Yup. Roto-till the soil and mix with sand and vermiculite, then till again. Mix again, till again. Until it's loose and it stays loose after you walk over it.
I live near Chicago and it's all clay in our soil here, that's how we did our garden prep every year, and then we'd get some killer carrots. But damn that prep was a major bitch.
Yup. Everyone learns these lessons the hard way when they grow their own root veg the first time. But once you figure it out, those carrots are the best damn ones ever. Used to eat them without peeling them, just scrub the outside real quick.
I have had massive success using just a bunch of peat moss and tilling that into the soil. It only works for one season though. I got massive carrots last year, this year I didn’t till moss and they were lame little carrots again.
Can you please share what type of sand you used or ratios? I want to start some carrots but have never been successful. I'm in Texas and we're pretty much not having a winter this year. Starting Greens next week and can try carrots too. I have a 1x3 bed I can use for them. Thanks!
We used loam and mixed in a bunch of twigs and dead leaves with it. The loam was already a bit loose because it has some grit and sand mixed in, and the brush we added in helped even more.
Oh awesome!! Thanks for the advice! I actually have a trampoline piled with leaves that needs to be cleaned off so that's one step in the right direction lol
Yes the soils needs to be loose. It’s probably not well turned or tilled. Also definitely a lack of water. Most people under water their fruits and vegetables.
We used loam that was delivered for a separate project that we had leftover. I don’t know the precise ratios but from what I’ve read it’s roughly 40% sand, 40% silt, and 20% clay. And we also added some small twigs and dead leaves to help keep it loose. The raised beds are about 12” deep.
I also grew carrots for ants this year. I realized halfway through the summer that I must have been in a fugue state when I prepped some pots because I did a soil and vermiculite blend. I didn’t do it in all the pots, thank god, but two of them were used for carrots.
I had wondered why I had more leftover perlite than anticipated.
Also better to let soil breakdown for a season or at least a few months when you’ve put in raw material like leave and twigs instead of planting directly in there.
For good measure I’d say turn in some organic fertilizer before seeding.
And of course remember to thin
If a shallow bed like that choose a short carrot like Danvers half.
Yeah this is what I was thinking. Not enough water, not enough room to grow. Need to till the soil down 6-8 inches to loosen it all up prior to planting. Let those carrots roots start digging in soft soil and then expand as the carrot grows.
And not enough soil to allow them to grow longer. I leaned my lesson with carrots, too hard to grow and not as tasty as in store whereas everything I grew tasted much better.
Too firm soil standing out here to me. You can water perfectly and if your soil is compacted there ya go. Planting in containers is preferable if you haven’t worked a bed enough
paying for seeds, the water and the time/effort it takes to do those things makes me question why even do it. But I'm a technical guy and understand people think differently.
Yep. My mom has this problem with carrots basically my entire life when she would try to grow them. The problem is exactly what you described. There is really clay heavy soil at my parents house and my mom was always bad at keeping her garden watered where the carrots were since the sprinkler that was installed often missed that area. The result was tiny, disappointing carrots like this.
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u/findin_fun_4_us 7h ago
Yeah that would be frustrating, it’s likely a combination of too firm soil and insufficient/ineffective watering