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Post by templeton on Sept 30, 2015 5:02:47 GMT -5
I've been growing out some mass cross selections for a short colored carrot project - I think I'm up to F3 or F4 or something. Anyway, I sowed some seed from selected parents last autumn, and decided to dig them for selection and replanting. Anyone done any carrot work? Blunt end looks fairly stable, and pinky/purple skin, but round balls, which was what I was after are a bit rare in this lot. If I plant these, how should i select? I'm a bit short on space, and don't really have a lot of space to segregate different lines with much chance of isolation. If these are carrying a fair bit of diversity, can i get away with less than the nominal 50 plants (to reduce chances of inbreeding depression).  And for info, the degree of purple penetration seems to vary somewhat - the deeper purple ones also seem to have green insides. |
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Post by rowan on Sept 30, 2015 5:42:14 GMT -5
I started a similar project but it has been put on the back burner for now. Yes, I had the same problem trying to get ball shapes. Looking forward to seeing what you get in the end.
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Post by templeton on Sept 30, 2015 7:14:12 GMT -5
I think I'll do a couple of tight little beds based on colours, and select only the roundest ones, hoping for mostly crossing within the colours. There are a couple of other lots that i haven't shown, including a few short fat overwinter ones from last summer. Hoping i get some early flowering off these, it's going to be hard to keep things alive his summer. I was hoping you had proceeded rowan and could give me a few pointers  T |
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Post by reed on Sept 30, 2015 12:19:22 GMT -5
I'm very interested in starting a carrot project. I planted seven kinds day before yesterday. Planted some last fall about this time and several looked good well into winter but only one survived rabbit attack. When I transplanted it this spring in took off and flowered well ahead of neighborhood QAL. I hope, as you mentioned that diversity can counter inbreeding depression as I can't afford to devote much space to something that takes a long time. I was very encouraged about the one that flowered as I may be able to make standard practice of growing and even harvesting through winter and getting seeds early summer. I'm going to try to select with that in mind.
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Post by steev on Sept 30, 2015 13:49:16 GMT -5
I put my seed carrots in a large pot to avoid gopher-predation; they flowered well.
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Post by templeton on Sept 30, 2015 15:36:00 GMT -5
I'm very interested in starting a carrot project. I planted seven kinds day before yesterday. Planted some last fall about this time and several looked good well into winter but only one survived rabbit attack. When I transplanted it this spring in took off and flowered well ahead of neighborhood QAL. I hope, as you mentioned that diversity can counter inbreeding depression as I can't afford to devote much space to something that takes a long time. I was very encouraged about the one that flowered as I may be able to make standard practice of growing and even harvesting through winter and getting seeds early summer. I'm going to try to select with that in mind. , I'm lucky, no QAL here, and i reckon Daucus australis flowers way too early for crosses - its a tiny microflora annual herb. One concern I've had with the autumn-winter-spring seed production technique is the potential to unwittingly select for early bolting. The carrots are now in the vegetable crisper for a few days - I'm still preparing beds for spring/summer, but this morning I thought by happy coincidence the cold and dark might initiate good early flowering. Should I remove the tops? |
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Post by richardw on Sept 30, 2015 15:54:28 GMT -5
Ive just looked up the import of carrot seed into NZ and its ok, so Gregg if you want a hand to do some grow outs i would love to help.
Maybe we both could select for different traits,a long carrot suits my deep soils well, could even add some of my Benhorn line to add a bit of length to it.
I do want to start another line of a Benhorn cross with some other carrots that are similar shaped, the reason for this is i'm keen to add more diversity to Benhorn which has been inbreed to much in the past.
No QAL here also, but 20 years ago the Benhorn line did grow about 5% white roots, that was in a area that did have wild QAL, having lived here now for 15 years no whites rooted carrots show up anymore.
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Post by templeton on Sept 30, 2015 16:39:33 GMT -5
richardw, I'll get seed in summer I guess, let you have some then.
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Post by steev on Sept 30, 2015 18:01:49 GMT -5
Unless the tops are dried or rotting, why would you remove them? Any healthy leaf you remove, the root will just have to replace, to get back up to photosynthetic speed. Let the carrots do their thing; if they reckon they've more leaf than is practical, they'll let some dry off.
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Post by richardw on Oct 1, 2015 14:23:05 GMT -5
I did that last year leaving the tops on after transplanting, most of the leaves dried off before the carrot came away again and grew new leaves, i reckon take about 50% off.
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Post by templeton on Oct 1, 2015 16:37:38 GMT -5
Yeah, a bit worried about transpiration losses, a week of summer weather coming this week - in the start of October - whew!
T
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Post by raymondo on Oct 14, 2015 5:19:48 GMT -5
Nice work templeton. QAL all over the place here otherwise I'd offer to help out too. Two seasons ago I let some carrots go to seed. The saved seed all produced thin, bitter, white roots but tough little plants. I was almost tempted to see what the F2 would produce but it would have meant access to neighbours' yards to kill of the QAL growing everywhere! |
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