Medwyn Williams
Hello. I'm Medwyn Williams – eleven times Gold medal winner at the Chelsea Flower Show, Past Chairman of the Royal Horticultural Society Fruit Vegetable and Herb Committee and President of the National Vegetable Society.
Moving out my Sweet Candle Carrots
What terrible weather we are experiencing at the moment, the plants must be so confused they don’t know whether it’s Spring Summer or Autumn! My Sweet Candle carrots for the Royal Welsh show have all been grown this year (as a trial) in large heavy plastic boxes with their intended purpose supposedly for the transportation of oranges. They are not cheap but we managed to buy two old ones with holes in the bottom and positioned then within the doors to the polytunnel.
Both were filled with sand (they took well over a ton each) and bore holes were cored out to a depth of 18 inches. There is 26 in each box and they have really grown well with one omission. This was certainly due to my myself as I must have omitted to sow one station!! The seed was s own during early March and both beds are as even as you could possibly get them.
On the 1st June a farmer friend came over with his John Deere and extending boom with fork lift attachment and moved both boxes outside. It was lovely Summers day but the day after it turned cold and wet and that’s the sum total of it more or less since then.
My potatoes for the Royal Welsh are also doing well with some powerful heavy haulms on them. I was given some orange plastic material by a friend who bought a roll of it at a farmers sale and it has certainly come in very handy. I wrapped it around the whole double row of potatoes and it’s certainly helped to keep the haulms upright and undamaged. They were given a liquid feed last week of Medwyns Liquid Gold which is a growth stimulant involving some new chemistry. I can use it as a foliar or as a drench treatment. Liquid Gold Increases root development and ensures maximum utilisation of all available nutrients. Excellent for drought tolerance by reducing transpiration through the leaves.
2 thoughts on “Moving out my Sweet Candle Carrots”
Will you be covering the carrots with mesh now they are outside? Also did yo add any soil at the base of the carrot box or is it all sand except for the boreholes?
I will not be covering them up as they seem to have stood up well to the recent bad weather. When we bought the orange boxes the first thing we did was drill holes in the bottom and sides before filling them with concreting sand. The colour at the moment of the foliage is nice and green with no tinge of red on any of them which would imply that there is some carrot fly damage to the roots. I have sprayed them twice with garlic oil this year, perhaps that has made a difference.