Did you use the little starter that has a "biodegradable " mesh around it? The one time I grew carrots they came out as clumped masses, the carrot version of a rat king, because the didn't fucking break down at all.
this post was submitted on 12 Aug 2026
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Carrots are notoriously hard to start from seed but they also don't transplant well. I'd guess somebody bought starts and the taproot (which eventually becomes the carrot) got bunched up in the transplanting process.
Those are mandrakes. Drop them in a pot with the hair from an enemy and dance widdershins around them.
They are beautiful! Would change anything about it.
You might have some real rocky-ass soil.
Are those Moulin Rouge carrots ?
The heat wrecked our carrots.
And damn near everything else we normally grow.
Tomatoes love heat. I'm hoping this is a good year for our peppers
They love heat to a certain point. Over 100 F every day for a month isn't it.
i'm mostly going off this gardening textbook my friend wrote, but you want that 100F every day for a month to get them to turn their flowers into fruit.
granted i read this a while ago, so eh
probably still taste better than supermarket
Could be that the soil was too hard so they couldn't go straight?
If it's organic maybe you can just eat them with the skin, just chop them as they are.
Carrot seedlings should be sown in at least 3-6" deep seed pots because the deeper their intial tap root goes the larger the end tuber.
In general deeper seed pods mean deeper and stronger roots for most plants. Go to garden centers and you can get 3x3x8" pods.
Snail roll method works for this but you have to transplant sooner cuz they outgrow it.
I had no idea you could transplant carrots! I guess I have done it (I hate thinning so I try and transplant the ones I pluck) but I have never thought of planting them so deep. I'll have to try it.
I have had monster carrots with my normal method though, which is like 1/2" trench.
NGL they probably wont like it. Main thing I'm suggesting is make sure they have enough depth to begin with cuz if that initial tap root hits a wall it's gonna stunt it in the long run.
I transplant seedlings by filling around an empty seed pod and then putting the seedling into the fitted hole. I find that is the gentlest way to transplant.
They'd probably not do well getting transplanted from a snail roll. I went a bit off topic there.
What depth should seeds be planted if going right into the ground?
That is 100% dependent on the seed variety. Some want to be on the surface, some just lightly covered, and others want over an inch of soil above them.
I was thinking they were grown in a centrifuge or a zero g environment, but this seems a little more plausible.
too hard so they couldn’t go straight
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
I think OP is making a joke about how the "Haunted Cronenberg-ass" carrots being unexpected rather than saying they are no good as people seem to be assuming. All you see until you harvest is the green and maybe a bit of the colour so it is unexpected when they look like Eldritch horrors.
I did want to throw out my two cents to people making critical comments to explain one reason why someone wouldn't eat those. If I harvested these, they would go into the compost pile to recycle the nutrients for next season. I'm not saying they shouldn't be eaten, but I wouldn't.
I have irrational fear of pathogens on food. I know it's irrational. Part of the work I do involves going into deep pump wells for sewage systems which is where all the gross stuff accumulates over time. No problem with that because I practice good hygiene. It's gross but whatever I'm not bringing snacks with me. Soil is also fucking disgusting. Again, it's okay when I am gardening because I wear gloves (mostly to protect against getting cuts or scrapes which could get dirt in them) and I also wash my hands and clean my nails when I come inside. But I need to peel or scrub root vegetables before I eat them. If there is any chance that some weird dirt is still there in one of the wrinkles, I can't eat it. It's not a conscious choice. My sympathetic nervous system goes into overdrive and my digestive system just decides to stop working so I know if I force myself to eat it's just going to sit there like a brick and I will feel awful even though the food itself is not hurting me.
These would take so much effort to clean it would just not be worth it. It would be difficult to crack open and to hold the small bits to brush. Soaking in still water or soaking in turbulent water like I do with potatoes before curing for storage doesn't work. I've tried. If I just had a small patch or this was my entire harvest, I might put in the effort. But when my carrots survive the mammals and make it to maturity, I usually have several pressure canner loads worth and this just isn't worth it.
Some of this fear comes from canning practices. Pressure canned veggies need to be washed and peeled because of the risk of botulism. The high heat and pressure does kill the pathogen but you can't be sure the interior of the canner is uniformly heated, so excluding the pathogen is another step. Acid foods which are water bath canned help prevent botulism from multiplying by being acidic, but you are also supposed to heat them again before eating. So yeah, I know the risk with fresh foods is rare because the pathogens don't really have time/the environment to multiply and become harmful but that doesn't really matter to my nervous system 🤷♀️
I don't need anyone telling me that I am wrong, that this is wasteful or to give me unsolicited advice. I am just sharing so that folks can understand one reason why people might not be able to use these and that it's not a conscious choice.
I don't have the same issue, but I've been eaten sushi, found a tiny bone, and been completely unable to continue eating. You don't exactly get a choice what your anxieties are going to latch onto.
Man, thats tough. A little dirt is good for the immune system
You make good points. Autoincorrect got you, it's eldritch not Eldridge
Thank you, I fixed it!
Is your fear a result of your work, or did you go into this line of work with that fear already in place?
I mentioned my work to explain that I am not grossed out easily overall. Sure, I could get splashed in the mouth or eyes and have been splashed on the body, but I had no wounds I was worried about and just showered and changed.
The food thing has been with me as long as I can remember. Its totally an autism thing but to be more specific, I think adherence to clearly defined "rules" about food safety is comforting especially if I am stressed out overall.
Did you grow them to eat, or to take pictures of?
They do look wonky! Bet they're delicious.
Fucked up veggies and fruits are far and away the tastiest. Once you start eating wonky veggies, you can’t stop. Everything else just tastes like gonorrhea on a biscuit, once you develop a taste for them.
From what I understand, they pump more sugar and general building blocks into areas that are unexpectedly obstructed. They’re genuinely just tastier. But don’t be fooled by those folded heirloom tomatoes. Their texture is atrocious. Specific varieties of heirloom tomatoes are the exception to the rule.
But don’t be fooled by those folded heirloom tomatoes. Their texture is atrocious. Specific varieties of heirloom tomatoes are the exception to the rule.
Do you find this to be true with both home grown (or very local grown) and store bought heirloom? Supermarket (fresh) tomatoes taste like garbage to me so I don't buy them but I am wondering if your experience with those heirloom varieties you mention is independent of that and they are just awful (at least to your taste) even in ideal conditions. That would mean I should probably try a variety before planting too many of them lol.
Home grown, you’re golden. It’s issues with long term storage and transportation that yield mealy, sugary messes that are difficult to cut, good to cook, and little else. Heirloom Roma tomatoes are all excellent for that reason. “Oh no, my cooking tomatoes were easy to paste!”
But there are certainly heirloom tomato varieties that are better or worse. Green zebra and starburst are my favorites, personally. Green zebras store well and taste like food. Starburst are beautiful on a plate or sandwich or as straight-up hand fruit. Hit up the farmer’s market to get samples to find your faves!
Thanks for the detailed reply!
To haunt my nightmares
Are ugly carrots somehow inedible or devoid of nutrients? It all turns into mush anyway, why be picky?
Harder to cook with, FWIW. Can't chop even slices out of them, or if you're roasting/steaming them, they likely won't cook evenly through when twisted around themselves. Still perfectly edible, but will take more prep or more attentiveness when cooking.
I think the best bet is for OP to get creative with chopping, just at least try to make chunks of similar thickness even if they're of wildly different diameter. Then roast the slices or throw them in a soup.
That's one weird carrot
Something is definitely turning your carrots gay. I've only ever seen the straight ones.
because carrots like this are destroyed by farmers. We destroy fruits and vegetables by hundreds of tons because of aesthetics.
@SaveTheTuaHawk @YaDownWitCPP that will change out of necessity in the near future. There has always been a garden in my life and the deformed were always eaten.
Ugly carrots go in the juice bin. Carrots surprisingly are some of the least wasteful vegetable crops that we grow.
Leafy greens like lettuce, spinach, arugula etc have a very short shelf life and some of the most waste. Strawberries, raspberries etc are the worst for waste due to molds.
Sadly it's not just aesthetics for why these vegetables are rejected at the grocery store. It's also for food safety as well. If you are picking them up out of the garden, washing them off, chopping them up and eating them immediately you have almost no risk of foodborne disease (unless you fertilized with straight manure a few weeks before).
Top grade produce needs to be uniform and easily cleaned so it can be shipped and not harbor diseases.
Iceberg lettuce became popular because the exterior of the lettuce can get all covered in crap during harvest and handling. Then you remove a few leaves from the outside and in the interior is mostly clean.
Something you might not know is that cantaloupes have shifted to a major different genetic groups in North America the past 15 years. The older varieties were a dark green immature. The newer ones are a grey green immature color. The netting on on grey green is much lower, finer and easier to clean. Anyone remember the listeria outbreaks from Colorado? This is the lasting change.
That would be horribly wasteful, and a loss for the producer. "Ugly produce" gets chopped and sold that way instead. You can't tell what a pre-chopped bag of peppers looked like.
We had heavy rains for days on end so at least 25% of mine had no bottom half due to rot :/
They're a bit small, but still perfectly good carrots!
These look so cool. Spiral carrots!
Those are some funny coloured ginseng roots you have there!
The carrots have likely been attacked by nematodes. I don't see any galls so it's likely a lesion nematode. These guys like to munch on the sweet tender new growth at the tip of the roots. This causes the forking in the picture.
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