Wednesday 12 October 2011

Jake The Peg

Do you remember Rolf Harris performing "I'm Jake the Peg, with his wooden leg, diddle diddle dum"? For some reason, this wierd Parsnip of mine reminded me of that!


Well, it looked OK from the top, while it was still in the ground, but it's going to be a bit of a challenge in the kitchen.


Just to redress the balance, I want to show you these carrots as well. They are ones that I grew in a deep plastic container positioned above Carrot Root Fly height.


I'm quite proud of those. Up till now I have had major difficulties with growing carrots, but these ones look pretty good to me. And I didn't have to throw any away either! I shall definitely be using this year's technique again.

This is my potting bench - made from some old kitchen units and a piece of worktop!
This puts a new meaning on the term "Raised Bed", doesn't it?  This year's experiment was only in small scale - I grew two lots of "finger" [i.e. salad] carrots in old plastic washing-up bowls, and this one batch of "proper" [i.e. main crop] carrots in the container you see above - but maybe next year I will try for greater quantity. The container pictured above was one which originally contained table salt. It's about 12" / 30cm deep, and has a capacity to support maybe 20 carrots, as long as you're not expecting show-winning specimens. I need about a dozen of those now. I'm thinking I might pay a visit to some local shops / restaurants and see if they can provide me with suitable containers for free. So many places these days chuck away lots of useful things!

11 comments:

  1. Ah a forked parnsip, still tastes good!

    Great idea for a raised bed, anything to get good carrots and these look splendid. Good idea to go and see if you can find many more recyclable tubs elsewhere for future carrots!.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow, that container looks so small too. I will have to try doing carrots in containers (if I can just keep them watered!)

    ReplyDelete
  3. I had good luck planting carrots in containers this year too. I'm definitely going to do it again next year.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Mark, I'm sorry to have to point this out to you, but that second picture, well that's vegetable porn if ever I saw it.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oh I've got to try that as I've never grown a happy carrot! Did you pierce holes in the base?

    I've just had a look at your My Plot link - you have the most wonderful garden. I'd loooove proper garden beds. One day.

    ReplyDelete
  6. My carrots have been a disaster something had eaten them and they have become all crumbly. I'm guessing carrot fly. It's very bad on the allotment site apparently. That's the only thing with allotments they do harbour more pests and diseases. All those weeds for the nasties to overwinter in and on. I would like to try them again though so I might have to try containers at home.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Mrs Bok; Yes, I did pierce holes in the carrot containers for drainage purposes.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I might have a bash at container grown carrots next year. Have you any idea if I could do the same with beetroot?

    Odd looking parsnip but I expect it will taste good anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Hi Toffeeapple; I reckon this method would work OK with beetroot - though obviously you would get less of them in the container; and beetroot grow OK in the soil anyway (they are seldom much affected by pests), so why would you want to grow them in containers?

    ReplyDelete
  10. I have difficulty in bending so wanted to grow vegetables in containers on a table.

    ReplyDelete

Thank you for taking time to leave me a comment! Please note that Comment Moderation is enabled for older posts.