Winter Carrots

Last fall I wrote about the “Carrot Cabana” I set up to protect our little carrot seedlings from the scalding summer sun, which stalks the skies here in August.

Well, it was worth it. This mid-winter, with snow on the ground (itself a rare thing in these times), I can report that I harvested those same carrots. Nothing can lift the spirits quite like digging through half-frozen dirt to uncover rows of iridescent orange carrots. They seem to just glow in the dark.

In most years, I pull carrots while there is still less than 10 hours of daylight. Any later in the calendar and the carrots start to turn their sweetness into efforts at becoming teenagers. Carrots, being well known for their polyamory, will cross with too many wild Apiaceae (extended carrot family members) that we have in the fields and woods around here. So saving carrot seed is not predicted to be agriculturally useful. But maybe I should do the experiment sometime.

All in all, I harvested about 30 pounds from that “Cabana” bed. They will keep well in the refrigerator throughout the coming spring.