what is it with Parsnips?

[Jack]

Gidday

I learnmt when I was a little biddy boy, always save your own parsnip seeds. I have never seen as good a result from bought seeds. For some reason parsnip seeds don't grow when they come outta a packet.

[Smooth Hound]

How would you go about collecting the seed?

[Jack]

Gidday

Just let one run to seed and the colleting is very very easy. They are large seeds to easyas.

[Muddypause]

Contrary to other people's experience with parsnips, I've been growing them for a few years now, and have never had any trouble with them. Maybe it's down to the variety - I grow Tender And True, which seem to germinate well and produce good, thick roots a foot or more long. I grow them in a deep raised bed, filled with fairly light, rich soil, sowing them thinly straight in the ground, and seldom bothering with thinning. Last year I experimented with a zig-zag drill, rather than a straight line, to try and get more into a limited space - seemed to work OK; they didn't seem to suffer with being crammed together.

Apparently, if you have a heavy soil, you can make a parsnip-shaped hole in the ground with a crowbar, fill it with compost and plant a couple of seeds in the top of it, thinning to one if they both germinate.

[Smooth Hound]

Apparently, if you have a heavy soil, you can make a parsnip-shaped hole in the ground with a crowbar, fill it with compost and plant a couple of seeds in the top of it, thinning to one if they both germinate.[/quote]

Interesting what you say here, this year i am starting my parsnip seeds in toilet roll pots and when they have germinated for 2 weeks i am then putting the whole toilet roll in theground, i am hoping this will do something like what is mentioned above. Mike

[sawfish]

Mine grew perfectly well after sowing straight into the earth in April. They take a long time to germinate so you must be patient.

Javelin was the variety.

[flower]

I don't have time to read the whole thread this morning so forgive me if I repeat what's already been said...

I find that parsnips sown too early don't germinate as well and are more likely to get canker. I sow mine about now to the end of April.

I mix some potting compost (50/50) with sand nicked from my daughter's playpen, I make a row of holes with a broken garden fork handle and fill with the sand/compost mixture and sow 3 seeds per hole.

Sometimes they take as long as 6 weeks to show so I sow several short rows at the end of other root type stuff so I don't waste a whole section if they fail.
so 15 in a block when I sow me carrots, 10 a week later at the end of the beetroot block, another dozen when I start direct sowing leeks and so on.

I use all different varieties from seedswaps cos at least one variety will fail each year.

And finally, can I just mention that they taste their best pulled in August when really small and tender, roasted with new potatoes in their jackets, olive oil and thyme

[Smooth Hound]

Yum Yum

[chadspad]

Earlier in the thread I put a tip on here about soaking the seeds first. The same day (20th Feb) I planted a packet of seeds out - half were soaked in water for a whole morning, the other half were direct from the pack. Ive just seen the whole row that were soaked are up! The other row, so far, has nothing.

[yugogypsy]

We have the same problem here, so what did come up we let go to seed, saved those and every blessed one came up the next year-so if you get anything at all, leave it in the ground and harvest the seeds in the fall!

Lois

[Millymollymandy]

I couldn't do that, because when I went to harvest the last of my parsnips, some rodent had eaten all the insides of the parsnip under the ground and left a perfect shell of the skin!

[yugogypsy]

thats awful

Lois

[Millymollymandy]

It was quite funny really! I've already got a freezer full of them and I was only going to give these 'snips to my neighbour for her horses!

[paradox]

Im going to be planting my parsnips in the morning so i shall put them into soak tonight with a hope of improving there chances.

My cabbages didnt come up at all this year so ive bought another packet of a different variety and started a fresh

[Cheezy]

Having failed to get my carrots to germinate, I was put off by trying parsnips (im on heavy clay soil.)

BUT NO! I say I have read this thread and I am going to soak some this week end (April 28th!)

I prebought the seeds and I'm damn well going to give it ago. I may be moving this post to "growing against adversity" thread!.

Do you think it's a touch too late?

What about container grown parsnips, and starting them off in a cold frame?