How to get a bumper parsnip crop
Question: I have tried growing parsnips for a couple of years. Hardly any seed germinates, maybe 3 out of 100 I plant. What am I doing wrong?
Answer: Are you planting fresh seed? Parsnip seed is one of the quickest to go bad of any veggie seed you can buy.
I sympathize. I have always had trouble getting parsnips to germinate as well. They can take more than three weeks to germinate. And that whole time, you have to keep the seed bed damp. No wonder they are hard to get growing.
Last year I tried a new way to grow parsnips and had tremendous success with germination.
Parsnips are members of the carrot family. Like carrots, they are biennials. This means their life cycle takes two years. The first year they grow a big taproot, and if left, the second year they bloom and set seed.
Instead of harvesting my whole crop last fall (a paltry five parsnips), I left one parsnip in the ground. It grew and grew and grew, until it was about 10 inches in diameter. Then this behemoth white root sent up an 8-foot stem with a giant umbell of a flower on top. I let the bees pollinate it and set seed.
When the seeds matured last fall, I shook them off into the raised bed below. In a couple of weeks, I had hundreds of parsnips germinating. They overwintered just fine and started growing again in February.
Then, in March, more of the parsnip seeds I scattered the previous fall germinated as well. So in my bed, I have half-grown parsnips alongside new baby parsnips.
So, I have a whole bed of parsnips growing, something I’ve never managed to do before.
This spring, I am thinning the more-mature, larger parsnips (now about a half inch to an inch in diameter) out. Parsnips need to be thinned to about 3 inches apart to grow to full size.
Thinned-out parsnips are great for stir frying or oven roasting with other spring vegetables such as carrots, beets, chard and kale.
I suspect my fall-germinated, ivory-white beauties will be ready to harvest at full size in the middle of the summer. I’m hoping I can hold them through the fall for the cold weather to sweeten them up.
In a perfect world, my spring germinators will reach maturity in the fall into winter so they will sweeten up as autumn cools down. Their flavor improves with each cold snap.
Territorial Seed Company recommends that the time to plant parsnips in our area is April through May. For overwintered parsnips, they recommend planting them in June until July 1.
Trick wipes cottonwood stickies right off
Dear Carol: I read your column in the Statesman Journal about cottonwoods recently. Some people shared with you how their dog’s paws were covered with those stickies that fall off the trees at this time of year. Thought I’d share with you a helpful hint for getting those cottonwood stickies off a dog’s paw (or even your shoes!).
Use hand sanitizer!
We live on a creek and have four cottonwood trees next door. And we happen to have a dog who is, of all things, allergic to cottonwood.
Our dog’s groomer told me she uses hand sanitizer, and so I bought some (with aloe in it so it would be soothing). Works like a charm! The cottonwood stickies slide right off! Works on your hands, too!
Another winning tomato
Dear Carol: Last week you wrote about tomatoes that succeed in our climate. Every year for the past 10 years I have planted tomatoes from Burpee Seed Company. The one I always get is called 'Fourth of July'. Depending on the year, I have had tomatoes on the 10th of July but usually a little bit later. Thank you for your articles.