radishes

Gail H
Gail H Posts: 359 ✭✭✭✭
edited November 2020 in Vegetables

This is very embarrassing to admit, but I can't grow radishes to save my life. I can grow much more daunting things, but those toddler-friendly little orbs elude me.

I have tried planting in early spring (which isn't too far off here in South Jersey) and I've planted in fall. The fall ones look much nicer, foliage wise, but still just spindly little roots. I dearly wanted to grow the Chinese Shawo fruit radish to have over the winter, but nothing worth mentioning so far. Any clue as to what I should try?

Comments

  • Torey
    Torey Posts: 5,679 admin

    This is a link to an awesome seed company here on the west coast. They have blogs on how to grow a variety of veggies and plants. This is the radish one.

    https://www.westcoastseeds.com/blogs/how-to-grow/grow-radishes

  • kjrobinson54
    kjrobinson54 Posts: 13 ✭✭✭

    Get your soil's pH tested and in line first.

    Radishes like a neutral pH around 6.5 to 7. If you are below that you will probably get beautiful greens but no root development. If that is the problem it's easy to fix just by adding some limestone (find the type labeled pulverized or agricultural limestone.) Mix some of that into your soil and add some good compost and you should soon see your pH ranges going back up into a more alkaline range.

    Keep it there and you should see great greens and radish bulbs also.

  • Gail H
    Gail H Posts: 359 ✭✭✭✭

    Thank you for your input! We do, in fact, have very acidic soil. We have a lot of oaks and wild blueberries.