For Prize-Winning Root Crops, Use a Raised Bed

Building your rows up to form raised beds can help you grow better root crops. Sometimes in heavy clay or shallow soils it’s a hassle getting long, straight carrots or parsnips, or large, well- shaped beets. The answer is to create a raised bed and heap extra topsoil onto the row from the walkways. It sounds like a lot of work but it’s not.

No matter what kind of soil you plant root crops in, get the seedbed smooth and as free of clods and rocks as possible. In rocky, clumpy ground, all the seeds won’t poke through the soil at the same time. This is a problem when you rake-thin and weed the first time.

Coaxing carrots with 0-20-0

To coax the best root crops possible from your soil, add a little phosphorus fertilizer to the seedbeds before planting. Broadcast a common commercial fertilizer such as 5-10-10. Use about 1 quart for each 100 square feet and mix it in the top 2 or 3 inches of soil.

Stake out the wide rows, then sprinkle a handful of bone meal or superphosphate (marked “0-20-0″ on the bag) over each 6 to 8 square feet of seedbed. It won’t burn the seeds because it does not contain nitrogen.

Phosphorus is important for fast, steady root growth, so this extra boost in the row helps deliver a fine harvest of root crops. There’s no need to side- dress root crops later in the season if the soil is stocked with nutrients early.

Again, don’t be afraid to thin with a rake

To make sure I get a full stand of plants with no gaps, I sow my seeds thickly. Root crops, especially parsnips and carrots, are slow to come up. Rather than waiting for each plant to poke up through the soil, I sprinkle in some insurance seeds.

Extra seeds don’t cost much. and they bring peace of mind. Even if all the seeds come up together, I can thin them quickly with my garden rake.

No matter how you plant them, root crops need a good thinning early. In my wide rows it’s essential. If you don’t thin root crops in a wide row, you don’t get any. And timing is important, too.

If you’re not sure of the technique, experiment. Grow and thin your main crop of carrots and beets as you normally would, but plant some extra seed in a few wide rows and thin them out with a rake. Then it won’t matter if you “ruin” your rows. But I’ll bet you won’t! In fact, I’ll bet you’ll have plenty of root crops without much work.

The code of thinning

1. Thin early, when the root crops are barely poking out of the soil.
2. Drag your garden rake across the row with the teeth going only ‘/4 inch deep. Do this in clay soil when the soil is loose. A good time is when the top of the seedbed has just about dried out after a rain, but before it bakes down. If you don’t get much rain, you can water the row gently in the morning and thin in the afternoon.
3. Usually one pass with the rake across the row is all it takes. If you see that a section of row is very thick, make another gentle pass over the area.

People first think that rake- thinning will ruin a row. It doesn’t. It may be a horrible experience the first time to drag plants out of a row with a rake. But you’ll get used to it after you see how your crops benefit.

White Icicle radishes good companions

White Icicle radishes help me grow better root crops. I plant them in with my carrots, parsnips, beets, and other root crops. The White Icicles help me thin the row, keep the soil of the row loose, and trap extra water.

After I’ve sprinkled the seeds of the main crop over the wide-row seedbed, I drop a pinch of White

Icicle seeds throughout the row. They probably number 5 percent of the other seeds. I tamp all the seeds down, cover the row with soil, smooth it out, and tamp it down again. It’s like planting any wide row.

The White Icicles sprout quickly. Their tops do not spread out like other radishes, so they do not block other seedlings trying to come up. They put a lot of energy into growing a deep straight root as quickly as they can. I let them grow.

Beets: Eat the whole thing, from top to bottom

A neighbor of mine once called the beet “a poor man’s steak.”

He said, “They’re juicy, tender, red, and good for you.” I still like a good cut of meat, but I agree that beets make fine eating.

I plant plenty of beets so we can enjoy an early feast of beet greens, summer dishes of Harvard beets and cold beet salads, beets for pickling, and a big bunch to store in the root cellar. The early harvests are especially rewarding, because we use the whole beet plant, the green tops and the tasty bottoms.

Beet seeds are unusual. They look like pieces of cork and are larger than other root crop seeds. Each one is a cluster of seeds from which several seedlings will sprout. Rake-thinning will separate these seedlings. If you try to pull the clustered seedlings apart by hand, you’ll damage the remaining ones.

Beets sprout easily in early spring when the ground is moist, but sometimes germination is poor in warm weather. It can be especially tricky in sandy soil. If the heat is on, I cover my summer rows of beets with a thin layer of mulch—only about ‘/4 inch thick. This is thick enough to shade the soil, but not too thick to keep plants from coming up. A light watering from time to time until the plants come up also helps.

Detroit Dark Red is the best producer I’ve grown. Like all beets, it can be grown for both greens and roots. Golden Beets are a novelty. The beets are carrot-colored but they taste like red beets and don’t bleed. Try some if your kids don’t like the red beets.

Lutz beets get very large and are surprisingly good at all stages, though they’re best when small. If you want to do some bragging, grow a row of Lutz beets.

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