Growing carrots has always been a challenge on my allotment and year after year and ideas after ideas I’ve finally solved my problem.
When growing carrots you have to think about a number of factors before sowing your seeds. Soil, location, drainage, sun and pests.
Carrots like to be well watered but not sat in a lot of water so well drained soil is essential. They do like the sunshine, so an area in your patch that almost always has the sun is also a must. The next top is an absolute must, if the plot next to you is growing carrots try to keep your carrots as far away as possible, this will help with the carrot fly. The carrot fly will try its best to hop from one plot to another, try your best to make it harder for them by keeping a good distance between crops.
From trial and error the best method we have found is to grow your carrots in large tubs, large plant pots, containers or even old dust bins. This gives you an excellent opportunity to control the environment in which you are growing your carrots.
With you starting with an empty pot you can fill it upto half way with good equality compost mixed with sharp sand. The sand will help with the drainage and the new nutrant rich compost will give the carrots plenty of food. As the plant pot is filled to halfway with new compost / sand your carrots won’t fork like the would if they came across a stone in the soil.
Why only fill the pot to half way?
To protect from carrot fly, the sides of the pot are ideal to protect the carrots at the sides, so all we need to do is add something over the top of the pot to ensure the flys can not get to your lovely crop. In the past we’ve used a carrot fly net using a large rubber band to around the pot to hold it in place.
Source: plant pots direct,