Vegetable · Apiaceae
Carrot
Daucus carota subsp. sativus
Hand it deep, loose soil and steady water, and the carrot pays you back with sweet, straight roots.
Full sun
Every 3–7 days
41–77°F · 5–25°C
60–80 days
Overview
Carrots are a cool-season root crop topped with feathery green and anchored by a long, sweet taproot that does every bit of its growing out of sight. They share a family with parsley and dill, and their wild ancestor goes back to Central Asia. Orange may be the picture in your head, but the crop also turns up in purple, red, yellow, and white.
Whether a carrot comes easy or hard rides almost entirely on the soil beneath it. Give the root deep, loose, stone-free ground and it dives straight down, but throw heavy clay or buried rocks in its path and you get a forked, stunted mess. Prep the bed right at the start and the rest of the job runs on patience.
Treat this biennial as an annual: you lift the root in year one and never meet the flower unless a plant survives the winter. Sow the seed where it stands, thin out the crowd, water like clockwork, and aim the crop at cool weather to draw out the sweetest roots.
Care
The short version: plant in full sun in deep, loose, rock-free soil, keep moisture steady at roughly an inch a week, thin the seedlings so each root has elbow room, and work a low-nitrogen feed into the bed before sowing.
Light
Carrots crave full sun, six hours a day or better, though a little afternoon shade helps where summers bake. Pile on too much shade and you grow leafy tops over let-down roots.
Water
Hold the soil evenly moist, around an inch (2.5 cm) of water a week, and water deeply so it reaches clear through the root zone. Let the bed lurch from bone dry to soaked and bitter, tough, or split roots follow.
Soil
Here is the make-or-break piece. Carrots demand deep, loose, well-drained sandy loam picked clean of rocks, clods, and debris, sitting at a pH of 6.0 to 6.8, since anything heavy or packed forks and stunts the root.
Temperature
As a cool-season crop, carrots are at their best between 41°F and 77°F (5°C to 25°C). They shrug off frost, and a late-season chill flips starch to sugar and sweetens the root.
Humidity
Plain outdoor air suits them just right, so skip chasing a number. The thing that truly matters is even soil moisture, not anything floating in the air.
Feeding
Dig a low-nitrogen balanced fertilizer like 5-10-10 into the bed before sowing, with an optional side-dress come midseason. Pour on the nitrogen or fresh manure and it bites back, throwing out forked, hairy roots.
Pruning
Nothing to prune here, but thinning is a must. Once the tops climb to about 2 inches (5 cm), thin the seedlings to 2 to 3 inches (5 to 8 cm) apart, snipping rather than tugging so you leave the keepers undisturbed.
Size & spacing
Tops rise about 8 to 16 inches (20 to 40 cm) while the roots pack in below. Space each plant 2 to 3 inches (5 to 8 cm) apart so every root gets the room to bulk up.
When to plant
Carrots crave cool air and hit their stride at either end of the season. Get the first sowing down a couple of weeks ahead of the last spring frost, keep dropping seed every few weeks into midsummer, and roots roll in from early summer through fall, picking up sweetness from every frost they catch.
Northern hemisphere
Southern hemisphere
Typical months for a temperate climate: start earlier in warm zones, later where spring frosts linger.
- Plant: Direct sow outdoors 2-3 weeks before the last spring frost once soil is workable and at least 7°C (45°F); succession sow every 2-3 weeks through midsummer for a fall crop
- Harvest: Harvest roots at any usable size, typically 60-80 days after sowing; fall crops can stay in the ground into cool weather, which improves sweetness. Flowers only appear in the second year if roots are overwintered.
Hardiness
USDA hardiness zones: 3–10
Temperature: down to -40°C
Troubleshooting
Most carrot trouble brews underground and stays out of sight until you lift a root, so the tops seldom sound the alarm in time. Learn the few signs that do surface, and pull a sample the moment something seems off. Match it to the list below, then put the bed right before you sow again.
Rust-packed tunnels eating into the roots
Grubby tunnels stuffed with rust-colored frass mean carrot rust fly larvae have moved in, while neater round holes point toward wireworms. Lightly chewed roots clean up with a knife, but the heavily bored ones go straight to the bin. Drape floating row cover over the bed from sowing day, shift the planting away from last season's carrot patch, and wait out the first egg-laying flight before you sow.
Fix:
- Harvest promptly and discard heavily damaged roots
- Cut away lightly damaged tissue and use the remainder
Contorted yellow new leaves over a bushy, hairy root
What you are seeing is aster yellows, a phytoplasma that leafhoppers ferry from plant to plant. New inner leaves yellow and twist while the outer ones blush red, and the root sours and sprouts a thick beard of hairy side roots. Nothing cures it, so yank and destroy any plant that catches it, then fence the leafhoppers out with row cover and clear away nearby weed hosts.
Fix:
- Remove and destroy infected plants; there is no cure
Roots that come up bitter, woody, or too small
Carrots go bitter and woody once watering swings between dry and drenched or the row stays packed with seedlings. Plants crammed shoulder to shoulder fight for space and end up thin and tangled, and a stretch of heat while roots are bulking pushes the flavor further off. Steady the watering to roughly an inch a week, thin to 2 to 3 inches (5 to 8 cm) apart, and time the crop for cool weather.
Fix:
- Resume deep, even watering of about 2.5 cm (1 in) per week
- Thin remaining seedlings to 5-8 cm (2-3 in) apart
Roots that fork, twist, or grow crooked
Send a taproot toward a rock, a clod, or packed-down ground and it will split and curl its way around the blockage. Fresh manure or too much nitrogen triggers the same forked, hairy growth, and root-knot nematodes can join the trouble as well. Dig the bed deep and clear out every stone before sowing, and the next round of roots drives down straight.
Fix:
- Harvest and use affected roots normally; flavor is unaffected by simple forking
- Deeply loosen and rake the bed, removing rocks and clods, before the next sowing
Green shoulders showing on the crown
Green shoulders appear where the top of the root rises above the soil line and soaks up sunlight. Only that upper inch or so turns, and once you trim the green off, the carrot underneath eats perfectly well. Mound a bit of soil or mulch over the crowns while the roots fatten and the greening never gets started.
Fix:
- Trim off the green portion before eating; the rest of the root is fine
Toxicity
Carrots are about as safe as a garden crop gets. Root and leafy tops alike are food, with nothing toxic to pets, livestock, or kids. The single thing to mind is a large raw chunk, a choking hazard you can solve by cutting it smaller for little mouths.
Safe for
People · Cats · Dogs · Horses · Rabbits · Livestock · Birds
Cats None
Carrot poses no danger to cats, and a few shreds of cooked or raw root make a harmless snack. Most cats shrug it off anyway, and the one thing to watch is a big raw chunk that could choke, so cut it down small.
Dogs None
Dogs handle carrot just fine, whether raw or cooked. Plenty of them love gnawing a chilled whole one as a low-calorie chew. Cut big pieces down so they are gentle on the teeth.
Horses None
Carrots rank as a classic horse treat and do no harm in reasonable amounts. Snap them into long strips rather than coin-shaped rounds, which can wedge in the throat, and keep servings small for an easy keeper.
Rabbits None
Feed a rabbit the leafy tops first, since the root carries a lot of sugar and works best as an occasional treat. None of it is toxic, just rich, so keep the orange part to a small share.
Livestock None
Cattle, goats, sheep, and pigs all happily eat carrots and tops with no poisoning risk. Ease them onto it slowly and chop it up so a greedy animal does not choke on a whole root.
Birds None
Backyard hens and parrots can tuck into carrot freely, and the bright flesh delivers plenty of vitamin A. Grate or finely chop it so smaller birds can handle it, and the feathery tops count too.
People None
Carrots are an everyday food, eaten raw or cooked by every age with nothing to flag. Put away a great many over a long stretch and the skin may take on a faint orange tint, which is harmless and clears up on its own.
No special handling required.
Varieties
Carrots arrive in shapes to suit every kind of soil, from the long supermarket roots to squat ones that brush off heavy ground. Here are the names worth keeping in your back pocket.
Danvers 126
Runs about 6 to 7 inches (15 to 18 cm) and tapers to a point, and it takes to heavier ground much more readily than the long skinny carrots do.
Scarlet Nantes
The go-to carrot for home beds: sweet, crunchy, cylinder-shaped roots that finish in a blunt tip and shine eaten fresh.
Imperator types
Those long, tapered roots stacked at the grocery store, and they only come up straight where the soil runs deep, loose, and free of stones.
Red Cored Chantenay
Short and broad-shouldered, this one earns its keep in shallow or heavy beds where longer roots would give up.
Thumbelina
A little round carrot that flourishes in containers and in the clay or rocky spots where standard roots fork and stall out.
Companions
Carrots do best beside onion-family plants that throw off the carrot rust fly, and quick crops like radish that share the row while the slow seed germinates.
Plant near
onion: Onion-family plants interplanted with carrots are traditionally used to help deter carrot rust fly
leek: Like onions, leeks are used in extension companion guides to help confuse and deter carrot rust fly
radish: Fast-germinating radishes sown beside slow carrots mark rows and save space; cited as a space-saving intercrop by UMN Extension
lettuce: Shallow-rooted lettuce shares bed space without competing with the deep carrot taproot
Keep apart
dill: Some extension companion guides advise keeping dill away from maturing carrots; the related species may cross-react and dill can attract pests of the carrot family
How to propagate
There is exactly one route to more carrots, and that is seed dropped straight into the ground, since the taproot flatly refuses to be moved.
SeedEasy
Early spring through midsummer, once soil is at least 7°C (45°F) · Germination in 1-3 weeks; roots reach usable size in about 60-80 days
Seed sown straight into the bed is the only way to grow carrots, because the taproot won't put up with a transplant. Drop the seed about a quarter inch (6 mm) deep anytime from early spring into midsummer once the soil reaches 45°F (7°C), then keep the surface damp across the whole 1 to 3 weeks it needs to sprout, which is slow enough to wear down anyone's patience. After that the roots size up to eating size in about 60 to 80 days.
Myths
Carrots can be started indoors and the seedlings moved outside the way you do with tomatoes.
Lift a young carrot and you jostle the fine taproot right as it means to push straight down, and a forked or stubby root is what follows. Carrots want to be sown right where they'll grow, then thinned in place instead of shifted around.
Pull every carrot before the first frost or you lose the crop.
Fall carrots take a light frost in stride. Cold actually converts starch into sugar, so the roots taste sweeter the longer they sit in cool soil, and across plenty of regions you can keep lifting them well into late fall.