I grew carrots!

I grew carrots! Last year when I first took on an allotment I listened to my fellow allotmenteers and concluded that growing carrots wasn’t for the faint-hearted. My neighbour went to great lengths to erect an enclosure to protect his carrots from carrot root fly. This year when I was looking at seed, I came across an F1 hybrid carrot seed that was resistant to carrot root fly, so I thought I’d have a go. As you can see from the photo, I was delighted with the result. They are a good shape and texture, although I think flavour has been sacrificed in the bid to breed in pest-resistance.

Wearing shorts to work over there seemed to make sense because of the heat, until I felt something biting my leg. I looked down expecting to see a red ant, and was surprised to discover the culprit was a spider! I was scared of spiders as a child but was always told ‘Spiders don’t hurt you’ (you can tell I was born and brought up in the UK). When I had children of my own, I didn’t want to pass down my fear of spiders and successfully de-sensitised myself to them many years ago. At home I’ll often leave them in undisturbed ‘nature corners’, thinking that they will get rid of other pesky visitors such as flies and woolly bears. Well, that’s my excuse anyway. Might not be quite so accommodating in future!