Carrots and parsnips

Last year, my carrots and parsnips were a disaster:  neither germinated due to the cold Spring weather followed by the drought.  I sowed the parsnips three times and the carrots twice - all to no avail. So, this year, I changed my modus operandi.  I sowed my carrot seed using the cornflour paste method and germinated my parsnip seeds on damp kitchen roll prior to sowing. Success! Both are now growing away.

Good luck with them Sean. I have got my carrots away at last. A second sowing. I think I may have cracked my parsnip problem. Flea Beetle!. My first sowing got me about 30% germination. I then resowed the gaps and watered the bed. After checking I noticed that the original 30% was down to about 10%. Something is eating them I have sowed a bed of peas nearby with very poor results. The seedlings have loads of small holes in the leaves. Flea Beetle damage I am sure. Not a pest easily got rid of being so small and avid flyers.

Sorry to hear you have a big problem Cristy, I have given up on parsnip this year but later carrots seem to be coming on well. It is mice I think that are my problem.
Congratulations Sean on finding a way to succeed you have plenty of knowledge when it comes to gardening

Deryn, it's not too late to sow parsnips again. Remember Robert the Bruce and the spider: if at first you don't succeed, try, try, try again! Put a couple of sheets of kitchen roll on a plate and wet them. Spread out your seeds and then put another sheet on top. Keep 'em damp and after a week or so you'll see the root coming out of the seed. Sow them then, carefully, about half an inch deep and keep them watered. A week or so later you'll see the seedling popping up. I have another tray of them ready to go out tomorrow.

Thank you for the advice Sean, I thought it was far to late to sow parsnip. will give it a go.
Would you sow kale now too or is to late?

Not too late for kale either! I grow lots of kale and am sowing seed tomorrow.

My carrot bed was looking pretty good and, I must say, I was quite proud of it. Alas, as the old saying goes: "Pride goeth before a fall!" This morning I discovered a nice rabbit had decided to dig three great holes in the middle of it. I actually saw him skedaddling through a small gap in the corner by a compost bin. Happily, (not for him) I'm pretty handy with a snare - which is a deadly device when properly set but a cruel instument in the hands of a bungler. I'm pretty confident I will be enjoying rabbit stew over the bank holiday!

So you dont follow the old adage of "Only kill a Rabbit when there is an "R" in the month" then Sean?. I, who have hunted Rabbits all my life would have second thoughts about killing a Rabbit now with a 60% decrease in their numbers. I preferred them barbecued meself.

Cristy, there is no 60% decrease in their numbers here - the place is overrun with 'em! I have to fence in everything against 'em! I always thought that the r thing referred to shellfish. Anyway there is an r in Jrune.

Update! Got him. Went out to check the snare and there he was on the carrot patch again! He got in somehow, bypassing the snare, but he didn't bypass the double-barrell. A three-quarter grown grazier - bit on the small size, but just right for a bit of stew with onions, carrots, spuds etc. Waste not, want not.

To protect our food supply anything goes I suppose. I did follow the "R" rule and for good reason. I hated skinning a milky doe. The thought of the kits starving in their burrows made me sad.

Yes, I agree. I don't hunt rabbits during the spring or summer for that reason. If that blighter had kept out of my carrots I wouldn't have bothered him either.