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Saturday, September 12

Thinning Carrots

If you have ever planted carrots, you know that the seeds are TINY, and I mean extremely tiny.  Unless you have some kind of special tiny seed planting device, it is very hard to plant these evenly.  So when I planted my carrots a couple of weeks ago, I knew there was going to be some carrot thinning in my future.  I had seeds everywhere!

Now, the first thinning should be done when the carrots are about 2-3 inches tall.  At this point, you only have to thin them to about an inch apart.  I usually just look for the one that looks the best and is the tallest and then pull the others around it out.  Once they start getting bigger, you can do the final thinning to about 2-3 inches apart.  The tool of choice for carrot thinning is tweezers.  It's hard to get your fingers in there without disturbing the carrots that you are leaving in.

There are a lot more carrots than it looks like in this picture.  Several are right on top of each other, so they definitely need to be thinned, even when they are this small.
And the finished product...

6 comments:

Unknown said...

OMG! Too bad I can't get carrot seeds now I'd plant them in a pot like yours...oh I can get them on the net!!! =) thanks for the idea!

Thomas said...

Uggg...I've been meaning to thin my carrot plants. I know you have to thin or they won't size up but I'm Mr. Greedy Gardener right now and want them all!

Lisa said...

Thomas, I know! I hate thinning anything because I don't want to lose any of them! It is definitely a necessary evil for carrots, though, unless you have a carrot seed tape (which I might try next year).

Thomas said...

Carrot seed tape??? What's that?

Lisa said...

Carrot seed tape is a roll of carrot seeds, like a roll of tape. I think it's just tissue paper or something flimsy and biodegradable like that. All of the seeds are perfectly spaced out on the tape, and then all you have to do is dig a little trench and roll the tape out in the trench and voila, perfectly spaced carrots. I think you can buy lettuce like that also.

I have found a few tips on how to make your own, so that might be a project this winter. I will do a how-to post if I end up trying it.

Thomas said...

Oh cool! Granny from Annie's Kitchen Garden was telling me how she glues her carrot seeds onto a paper towel to get them evenly spaced. That's such a great idea. Though I don't know if I'd want to use regular old Elmer's glue to do this. haha.

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